The word out of Frisco and TSN is that every NHL player placed on waivers over the weekend has cleared, including seven Dallas Stars sent through on Saturday morning. Eric Godard, Maxime Fortunus, Brad Lukowich, Travis Morin, Raymond Sawada, Dan Spang and Francis Wathier all required waivers to get them down to Cedar Park, potentially.
Placing players on waivers that early, while rosters are so full, reduces the chance that a player will be claimed. This does not mean that Eric Godard will start the year with the Texas Stars. It merely opens up the possibility. They'll have 30 days now where they can send him down without issue if they so choose, before he'd have to go through waivers again.
Entering the last full week of preseason play it's expected that the Stars will send most of those players down to participate in Texas Stars camp, which opens in full tomorrow morning. It's possible they'll keep a good amount through tomorrow night's game at Florida, but after that we'd expect them to keep only a handful (guys like Dillon, Larsen, Fraser). They could also keep Scott Glennie (still injured) and try to get him in at least one preseason game but there's been no word of his progress.
Thursday night when you and the 11,000 friends you're bringing to fill up the building arrive at the AAC, you should see something resembling a more NHL-type lineup.
Coach Glen Gulutzan told media after Sunday night's game "We've balanced our lineups with our play in pre-season so far with pairs and lines and young guys. These last three games we are going to narrow it down to our team and try to develop some chemistry." [DMN]
It is my understanding that Tomas Vincour, being 20 years old now and 19 years old when he signed his entry level deal in March of 2010, does not yet have to pass through waivers, despite having played so many NHL games last year, so don't read anything into his exclusion from the waiver wire.
Speaking of Matt Fraser and Tomas Vincour...an afternoon thought to chew on: Is Tomas Vincour, who passes the old eye ball test magnificently and does "everything but score" as we said last year, the opposite of Matt Fraser, who I've seen play a few times now and I don't really notice him a ton until he's putting the puck in the net, which he does with regularity no matter where he is?
One other note - Injuries are opening the door for Fabian Brunnstrom to sign a contract in Detroit. [Free Press]