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Dallas Stars Daily Links: Rick Bowness Is Bullish On The Stars’ Future

But seriously: What can this roster do when it’s healthy? Plus, Robo is officially a Calder Trophy finalist, a drama-free 2021 NHL Draft Lottery, and more.

It’s barely June, and it’s already been a long offseason for the Dallas Stars. It’s given their fans plenty of time to think about what might have been if the team had ever been completely healthy – but also a tantalizing idea of how they will look this October.

Stars senior staff writer Mike Heika sat down with head coach Rick Bowness for a look at last season and a preview of the next. They talked about what the coaches are up to during the playoffs, and what they’re already looking to bring to training camp:

We’ve had a couple of meetings with the coaching staff on things we know we can do better and we’re all watching a series, watching teams, and we’re talking about that. We’ve been watching Colorado and Winnipeg [and St. Louis in the first round] so we can get familiar with the teams in the Central Division we didn’t see this year. So, we’ve put a lot of focus on that. Plus, in watching other teams, if we see a faceoff play or a small detail we could use, we talk about that....

We were happy with our camp in July and felt it was productive despite all of the issues. We’re focused on that again. We feel we have a good idea of what we need to do in camp and all of the details we need to address, so we’re confident in that. We know we can improve.

He also confirmed what many Stars fans suspected – that the team really, really missed Tyler Seguin in overtime:

Our No. 1 goal to start is to win that faceoff. If you win the first faceoff, you control the puck and that allows you to do a lot of things like control when the line change is made for yourself or force a change for the other team. Did we have defensive players out there sometimes? Yes, but it was probably with the intent of winning the faceoff. Had we had Seggy, he probably would’ve been out there to start a lot of overtimes. When we had injuries to a lot of our best offensive players, we did go with different type players, but it was always with the intention of controlling the puck and creating opportunities. When we go into overtime, we have the mentality of ‘we’re going for it.’ We did that in the playoffs last year and we tried to do that as much as we could this year. That’s our philosophy. I know it didn’t work out for us this year, but we want to go for it.

There’s much more at Mike’s place. [Dallas Stars]

Stars Stuff

Jason Robertson: It’s official.

The Stars: Feeling it.

Sami Vatanen: Ready to celebrate.

Around The Leagues

Stanley Cup Roundup

The Montreal Canadiens beat the Winnipeg Jets 5-3, but did it cost them Jake Evans?

And the Colorado Avalanche have something extra to play for now that they’ve moved into a 2-0 series lead over the Vegas Golden Knights after last night’s 3-2 OT win.

Mark Scheifele has some Department of Player Safety-style explaining to do today for this charge he put on Evans last night.

The only good thing in all this was Nikolaj Ehlers, who put his own body between his stunned opponent and the inevitable fist carousel.

John Tavares still hasn’t seen the collision that knocked him out of the Toronto Maple Leafs’ playoffs run – and after seeing how his family has reacted, he’s not sure he wants to.

Meanwhile, what kind of league holds a draft lottery in the middle of the playoffs? It’s one of those things that can be explained by COVID-19, but just barely.

Have any young hockey fans in your household? Sean Shapiro has some news that might be relevant to their interests.

Greetings From Scenic Cedar Park

Texas Stars bench boss Neil Graham offers a peek into how a professional team copes with a pandemic (two words: banquet hall).

Finally

Jim Nill is all of us today. Enjoy.

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