Stars recall Philip Larsen and Maxime Fortunus

This makes my inner Dane happy.

Both will join the team in St. Louis today, and will likely stick around and get some playing time in the last few games of the season. Larsen just wrapped up his season playing with Frolunda in the Swedish Elite League, and Fortunus has played most of the season with the Texas Stars in the AHL. We've seen a bit of Maxime this season in Dallas, and he's played solid when up here.

A fifth rounder in 2008, Larsen is the first Danish defenseman to be drafted, and only the 6th Dane ever to be drafted. Apparently Joe Nieuwendyk is really high on Larsen. As Mike Heika points out, Larsen was probably a huge factor behind trading away Ivan Vishnevskiy before the trade deadline for Kari Lehtonen. He's smaller and has pretty good offensive instincts. From the Stars press release:

The 6-1, 183-pound native of Esbjerg, Denmark, has played in 116 games over four seasons with Frolunda, amassing 27 points (3 goals, 24 assists). He added five goals and five assists in 24 games with Boras in the Swedish second division in 2007-08. Larsen represented his country in four consecutive World Junior Championships (2006-2009) as well as the 2009 World Championships.

Pretty salty. I'm sure the Stars want to get a good look at Larsen playing on the big level this year before they send him off to the AHL next year.