Ok! I confess. I’ve been trying to make excuses as to why the Stars will or should win games. After Tuesday’s loss, though, I’ve realized that perhaps the Dallas Stars aren’t as good as I want them to be.
Let’s face it, though. I’m not the only one. We’re less than two years from them playing in the Stanley Cup Final. Since then, they’ve missed the playoffs and this year they’re hovering around .500.
As I wrote the other day, Dallas shouldn’t have had any problems with the Montreal Canadiens Tuesday night. Instead of an easy win, Dallas suffered a humiliating loss. Tonight, the Stars will play the first game of a four-game road trip. Tonight’s opponent, the Buffalo Sabres is another team towards the bottom of their division. But this game is on the road, so that means the Stars will have to play near-perfect in order to have a chance to win the game.
Dallas Potential Lines
Jacob Peterson (40) – Roope Hintz (24) – Joe Pavelski (16)
Jamie Benn (14) – Tyler Seguin (91) – Denis Gurianov (34)
Michael Raffl (18) – Radek Faksa (12) – Luke Glendening (11)
Rhett Gardner (49) – Riley Damiani (13) – Joel Kiviranta (25)
Ryan Suter (20) – Miro Heiskanen (4)
Esa Lindell (23) – Jani Hakanpaa (2)
Joel Hanley (44) – John Klingberg (3)
Braden Holtby (70)
Jake Oettinger (29)
The Buffalo Sabres
The Sabres haven’t enjoyed the season they were hoping for this year. Of course its never good when you have to start the season off by trading your star player. Luckily the Sabres were able to get something in return for Jack Eichel.
Jeff Skinner leads the Sabres with 14 goals. The only other player with at least 10 goals is Tage Thompson (12 goals). Thompson and Skinner both have 24 points to lead the team. I’d like to say I know what’s going to happen tonight but, I don’t have a clue. It all depends on what team shows up for Dallas.
Buffalo Potential Lines
Jeff Skinner (53) – Dylan Cozens (24) – Alex Tuch (89)
Victor Olofsson (71) – Peyton Krebs (19) – Kyle Okposo (21)
Mark Jankowski (17) – Tage Thompson (72) – Rasmus Asplund (74)
Anders Bjork (96) – Cody Eakin (20) – John Hayden (15)
Rasmus Dahlin (26) – Henri Jokiharju (10)
Mattias Samuelsson (23) – Mark Pysyk (13)
Robert Hagg (8) – Will Butcher (4)
Michael Houser (32)
Aaron Dell (80)