The NHL season begins this week, with the Stars starting their 2025-26 campaign with two road games against divisional rivals.
Expectations are high after three consecutive Western Conference finals appearances. The Stars return the bulk of their core from last season and bring in a new coaching staff, which they hope can get the group over the hump.
Before Dallas travels to Winnipeg and Colorado, here are five bold predictions for the Stars in 2025-26:
The Stars finish with a top-three power play in the NHL
Sports Roundup
The Stars will have a new look on special teams this year with a coaching staff equipped to make the group near the league’s best.
Pete DeBoer and Steve Spott, who ran DeBoer’s power play, departed in the offseason, and Dallas brought in head coach Glen Gulutzan and assistant Neil Graham to manage the unit.
Gulutzan ran the league’s best power play (26.8%) in his seven years as an assistant in Edmonton. Graham has experience working with some of the Stars’ top power-play contributors like Jason Robertson and Thomas Harley during his time as the Texas Stars’ head coach.
The Stars’ power play had finished fifth and sixth in the league, respectively, in the 2022-23 and 2023-24 season but took a significant dip to 17th overall last season after a rough start. The power play improved in the playoffs but will need more consistency.
Gulutzan and Graham intend to allow the Stars’ top players to have some freedom and will mix up the units to avoid the power play getting stagnant. With talent like Mikko Rantanen, Wyatt Johnston and Robertson on the top unit, Dallas has the potential to be one of the league’s toughest to stop on the man-advantage.
Jason Robertson breaks 100 points again
If there’s a year for Robertson to be at his best, it’s this year.
While he led Dallas in goals last season, two injuries derailed his year and left him feeling lost at times. Offseason surgery ahead of last season led to a slow start, and a knee injury in Game 82 of the regular season sidelined him for the start of the playoffs.
Robertson still managed to hit his stride to become one of the league’s top scorers for a stretch after the new year.
In a contract year and with a spot on Team USA in the Olympics on the line, expect Robertson to be especially motivated and hit the ground running in October. He should be able to hit at least 30 goals for a second straight year, and if he can rack up some assists on the power play, Robertson could challenge his 2022-23 numbers (46 goals, 63 assists for 109 points).
Nils Lundkvist solidifies top-four role with 20 minutes of ice time a night
Nils Lundkvist was pushing for more playing time last season when season-ending shoulder surgery sidelined him.
But as one of the most physically fit players on the team, Lundkvist has already captured the attention of Gulutzan and is being given an opportunity to earn a larger role.
Lundkvist is expected to start the year skating alongside Harley in a top-four role and also play more than he ever has on the penalty kill. Expect him to capitalize and average 20 minutes of ice time a night for the first time in his career. He’s never averaged more than 16:19 in a season.
The preseason has been an early indicator that Lundkvist is ready for a heavier workload. He played nearly 24 minutes in the loss to Colorado over the weekend and followed it up with a 19-minute showing Tuesday against St. Louis.
Jake Oettinger is Vezina Trophy finalist
It’s been a challenge for any netminder to challenge Connor Hellebuyck for the Vezina over the last two seasons. But Jake Oettinger plans to challenge him for the starting role on Team USA, so why not do the same for the league’s top goaltending award?
The best Oettinger has finished in the Vezina voting was fifth in 2022-23. He finished eighth last season, receiving just one third-place vote.
But like Robertson, Oettinger has a lot to play for this season. Starting for Team USA has been a lifetime goal of his, and after ousting Winnipeg from the playoffs, there’s a case he’s better suited than Hellebuyck when the lights are brightest.
Also, after how last season ended with DeBoer yanking Oettinger in the first period of Game 5 against Edmonton and placing much of the blame on him for the series loss, the Stars decided to part ways with the coach. He has the chance to show early this season that that was the right decision.
The Stars have also focused heavily on defense in training camp. If Dallas can improve its blue line play, that will help its netminder out tremendously.
The Stars get eliminated in the first round of the playoffs
There are a lot of unknowns with the new coaching staff, but Gulutzan does not have the same postseason track record as DeBoer.
While DeBoer never won a Stanley Cup, he was a mainstay in the conference finals. In Gulutzan’s four seasons as an NHL head coach, he’s never advanced past the first round and made the playoffs just once.
With Edmonton, he went as far as a team could go without winning. But will it be different with him steering the ship?
The Stars only survived the first round against Colorado and Vegas the last two years because of courageous Game 7 wins, and DeBoer was the best at those. If they draw another difficult first-round opponent, they may not have the same luck without DeBoer’s experience on the bench.
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