Dallas Stars Sale & Bankruptcy: First Hearings Scheduled For Today

Ladies and gentlemen, Dallas Stars hockey is back. This weekend the team kicked off training camp in PEI and participated in a good scrimmage on Sunday -- Jamie Benn was the best player, of course -- while getting ready for the first preseason game against Montreal tomorrow night. It's an exciting and optimistic time for Stars fans as we get ready for what I feel should be a very good season.

What the players are having to to ignore while they focus on hockey, of course, is that the bankruptcy proceedings in the sale of the Dallas Stars is currently underway in Delaware. Brenden Morrow spoke about it this weekend, saying that he's been "hearing for a year and half now it will be done next week." The players know all they can do is just play hockey and we'll let the sale take care of itself.

Today marks the first day of scheduled hearing in the bankruptcy case. The Dallas Stars filed last week, which essentially froze all assets and halted business operations. As part of Chapter 11, however, businesses are allowed to continue operating while the bankruptcy case is pending but only with approval of the court. With the filing coming late last week, the hearing had to wait until today for the team to file a motion to continue to operate as business as normal.

There will be up to twelve motions scheduled to be heard today, most of which have to do with allowing the Dallas Stars to continue business as normal, including the maintenance of bank accounts and cash management as well as the continuation of worker's compensation and liability, and other insurance programs. Essentially, today is to ensure that even though the team is technically in bankruptcy -- none of the employees of the team nor the team itself will be affected during these proceedings.

There will also be a motion before the court today that seeks to schedule a hearing on short notice to approve the bidding procedures associated with the sale.

We're still doing our best to go through the bankruptcy documents and interpret some of the finer points of the sale, but in the meantime Defending Big D will be keeping you up to date in every step of the sale and bankruptcy as we close in on this entire ordeal finally coming to a conclusion.