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Dallas Stars Daily Links: Early Season Struggles

It hasn’t been a good start to the season, but can the Stars <em>do</em> anything about it? Plus, Dallas looks for their first win tonight against Washington, why so many players pass clear waivers, and more.

The Dallas Stars have started the season 0-3-0, which has caused some panic among fans. But is there anything Dallas can actually do to try and “fix” things?

Trading for a player is one potential solution, but Mike Heika doesn’t think that’s in the cards anytime soon:

...Jim Nill could always make a salary for salary deal if he really felt the need to change things up. But when they drew this up in the off-season, they were confident in the plan, so I think they need to stick with it... I think their plan this year is to fill their biggest need in January or February with a high dollar player who will become a UFA in the summer. So I think they are saving whatever LTIR they might have for later in the year.

In the end, the Stars’ only real option is to be patient (for now). But the team will need improvement in a lot of areas if they want to truly reach cup contender status:

They don’t possess the puck enough and establish offensive zone time, so they don’t get as many scoring chances as the opposition. That also means they don’t draw penalties, because they don’t force the opposition to defend as much. They also don’t finish very well on the chances they do get... For the skill they seem to have, this is not a very good offensive team.

You can read more from Heika’s recent Q&A here.

Stars Stories

Miro Heiskanen is pretty darn good at hockey — Matthew DeFranks breaks down some film from the first three games:

The Stars face off against the Washington Capitals tonight, with Evegeni Kuznetsov making his season debut. This is gonna be fun...

Around the League

It was a quiet Monday in the NHL, with only two games on the docket:

  • In a battle of Stanley Cup contenders, the St. Louis Blues prevailed 3-2 over the Toronto Maple Leafs. [Pension Plan Puppets]
  • On the other side of the standings spectrum, the Blue Jackets picked up their first win of the season, beating the Buffalo Sabres 4-3 in overtime. [The Cannon]/

The Ottawa Senators with the New York Rangers for Vladislav Namestnikov, because... umm... well you see...

Evgeni Malkin is going to miss some time, but it’s not as bad as it could have been:

The regular season isn’t even a week old, but that doesn’t mean we can’t have some Power Rankings:

Roope Hintz gets a little more “breakout candidate” love as the ESPN crew makes their season predictions:

Why can’t we be friends? Why can’t we be friends?

Finally, Craig Custance gives some insight on why we hardly ever see waivers claims in the preseason:

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