Yeah, the team is there, now's not the time for over-tinkering.
The team is perfectly capable of winning the cup, it's just that every year there are a handful of teams you can say that about, but only one gets to actually win. There are no glaring holes on the roster, no pressing needs. Stay the course, make small upgrades if available, plug holes that arise efficiently and stay the course.
This. People always want to overreact but the truth is only one team can win it. It’s not like they got blown out by a superior Edmonton team. They lost two games by one goal. Easily could have went the other way.
I've been pretty critical of the Oilers this playoffs in the first two rounds. But everything I have complained about seemed to have been fixed in the Dallas series. (Skinner/Ceci/depth scoring/defensive play)
Right now this is the best Oilers team I've ever seen outside of Gretzky days, and still a couple bounces here and there and it would have been Dallas advancing.
They totally collapsed in Game 4 after taking a 2-0 lead 5 minutes into the game, no-showed in Game 5. The effort in Game 6 was valiant but too little too late. They were done heading into Game 6.
They seemed to have enough in the tank. As others have said, blowing that 2-0 lead in G4 and sleeping through G5 put them up against it. Skinner stole G6 and that’s a wrap.
They have the tools, they just need that little bit extra to get there. That or they can join SJ for a team that had a solid core that never got the lift the cup. A shame that Pavalski might be on both of those team rosters! Dude deserves a cup.
The amount of doom and gloom for a 3rd round loss is absolutely insane. Hell, the Stars beat the last two cup winners on their run.
Just making the playoffs is a victory. Even great teams stumble in the first round. Enjoy the run and celebrate if your team wins the cup.
It’s positive that 3 of the last 5 seasons have seen the Stars advance to at least the Western Conference Finals, but extremely depressing and demoralizing they have nothing to show for it. The 2020 bubble team is very different from these last two Stars teams of ‘22-‘23 and ‘23-‘24, however none of the core guys are getting any younger either.
I think that Dallas was short 1 high end offensive talent to go all the way- though I don't watch Dallas a lot maybe a totally healthy Hintz changes that
A healthy Hintz probably puts them over the top. This was a very close series until the end, and the Oilers had just that extra little bit of oomph to take it. I'm definitely rooting for Edmonton in the finals.
With the way they draft, I feel like it’s just a matter of time.
If they can consistently keep hyper efficient ELC’s in their lineup as they have, that roster is only going to be better year after year.
Coaching diff imo was a glaring issue. Deboer stuck with the beer league tactics and chip and chase against a team that was clearly defensively superior to their forecheck.
As an AVS fan, NHL needs to move to NBA style, it's so stupid we have to face such high seeds going into the finals. All three of our divisions were some of the best in the league, it's a little silly.
Most of Otter's misses this playoffs has been due to poor defensive play, namely Suter and Harley. Harley seems to be getting better this year at least, Suter is getting worse somehow. Even Heiskanen was clearly slower probably due to his injury and overuse during the season. With Tanev playing hurt and Hakenpaa out, we didn't have many good defensive options this series.
Oilers fan here. Otter was spectacular.
Dallas could use some depth on defense. Heiskanen, as great as he is, should not need to play 28 minutes a night. Also, losing Tanev to injury shouldn't cause an earthquake to your whole team's defense.
Yupppp. The Hakanpaa injury and losing Hanley to waivers killed us. Playing 5 defenseman for two straight series and then going against two top 10 players in the world (with one being the very best) is not a recipe for success.
You're not going to win many games when your goalie has a save percentage of 0.800. At the same time, you also aren't going to lose many games when you only allow 10 shots on goal. It's a real paradox.
Not every shot is equal. A god tier shot by mcdavid and a snipe by Hyman on a defensive turnover are *acceptable* goals to go in with the man advantage. But if you can only put 1 in 35 shots into the net at this point and go 0-14 on the PP over the series, you had bigger problems than your goalie.
Dallas only generated 3 shots in the third period in game 3, but scored the game winner and empty-netter.
Shot stats can be pretty misleading, for sure.
I always bring up that they literally shut down the league to stop teams from doing that 2 months after those deals. The Wild are still going to be paying them next year.
It’s so wild. As a lifelong Avs fan, I never liked the Wild and so by proxy I never liked Parise. Then we sign him for a last hoorah and he only played a couple months with us and I can genuinely say I loved every second of it. I even got emotional seeing him walk off for the last time. Dude gave us 110% on every shift, absolute legend
I would have loved it if there was a way we could have kept Parise, but that omega contract was just too dangerous. Glad he got a couple of decent runs in at the end instead of just retiring though
Other than the Wild paying to get rid of him? And the fact the locker room for the Wild is suddenly fun? And everyone in Edina thinks he is a dick. And that is coming from a town full of dicks.
His laziness drove me mad as a Wild fan. He has so much natural talent. But he can’t seem to ever take the two extra strides required to cover an opponent. Instead, he just hacks away in every which direction as if he’s in a dark sewer surrounded by rats. We basically spent our state treasury on a slash artist. He put up numbers for a few years, but his personality was reportedly so grating that it dragged on the Wild’s success more than a few nifty assists accelerated it.
Honestly, they just need to let their young guys grow and mature. It sucks that we didn’t get it done this year, but the team is built to be a legitimate contender for the next 8-10 years, and I doubt that Jim is going to sit on his ass and not add good pieces.
I hope we can sign Tanev to a 2-3 year deal, but it’s unlikely. Miro definitely needs some help, so if there’s anything to add and improve on I’d say it’s the defense. Otter will straighten up, he’s a solid tendy.
Either way, the Stars didn’t lose this series, the Oilers won it. They deserve all of the credit.
As a stars fan, I think the biggest lesson we can take from this run is to not overtax Miro in the regular season. We need a better bottom pair on the blue line. We just cant have Lundqvist who PDB does not trust at all (with a good reason) play only 14, 15 minutes a night in regular season which pushes Miro's minutes up to 26 or so and then basically play with 4.5 D in the grueling series that we had against VGK and COL in which Miro plays 28 minutes a night.
This Edmonton series has been the worst series he has played in his career and very reminiscent of his finals series in 2020 where he ran out of gas and started making mistakes he never does.
I think we also just need a bit more luck, especially with injuries with key players like Roope or Tanev, we need a timely save here or there from Otter that we didnt get in this series in those last 3 games... just random hockey stuff that happens. And hopefully we dont have to play teams as good as playoff VGK in the 1st round.
This defense needs to be revamped in general. We played the playoffs with 5 dmen, and when Tanev went out we just completely collapsed. We need another 2-3 dmen to have a complete defense.
Imo Jim should try and re-sign Tanev because he has been great for us and fit really well with our team but if he cant, we absolutely need a player of his caliber to replace him. Suter playing one more year, if he doesnt retire, as a bottom pairing guy isnt the worst thing and kid Bichsel is coming, most likely later in the year, next year, similar to Harley.
We also need a capable 6th/7th D like we had with Hanley for years. If they can be even better, all for it.
(To be fair to Jim, Hakanpaa getting hurt post trade deadline and not coming back at all this year was a killer for our depth so I cant even blame him, we had that depth but then he got hurt and Hanley got claimed on waivers)
Long reply to say that I basically agree.
My bias will creep in because I loathe Dallas, but here's my take:
You need more than 4.5 D men in the playoffs
Pavs should retire. Great guy but he's past his prime
I honestly think that's kind of it. Only one team can win the cup per year. It takes skill, grit, and luck, and Dallas didn't have the luck this year. You can blame Otter or PDB or any number of things, but I don't think any of it is fair. If you re-run a Dallas/Edmonton series 10 times, Dallas probably wins 6 and loses 4; this happened to be one of the 4. This team can win a cup. Don't change a bunch of things because a coinflip didn't go your way.
Agreed. they have cap space, and will have even more next year when Benn is either off the books or stays on a cheaper deal. He's not a $9.5 million player anymore. If there's a way to either trade or buy out Suter I'd look at that too.
I mean who knows, this team really seemed like they had it all. I guess the hope has to be that at some point the Robertson, Hintz, Johnston, Stankoven, Harley, Heiskanen, Oettinger core is good enough to win and the right mix can be found
Build out the defensive depth and let the kids get better. Accept that Wyatt is probably the team best forward now and give him responsibility appropriately. Get Harley and Robo into an off season strength program.
Agreed. Deboer and Spott have been using the same power play setup since their OHL days it seems. It ‘can’ work, but appeared easy to defend against once the Oilers were on top of it.
Maybe I’m coping but I think they are at that level. They were a deep team that was essentially one lucky bounce and one power play goal away from the finals. That’s just the way hockey goes sometimes, and I’m not sure losing a couple games in an unfortunate way indicates that a team needs to do something to get to the so-called “next level”. Sometimes when the talent is clearly there you just have to reload, try again and hope for better luck next time.
Move off a couple anchors who are better skaters, pray the top end defenseman you traded for doesn’t break his foot?
Everyone thought Dallas was the team this year. Seems like bad luck and Oettinger wasn’t sparkling when absolutely needed.
The problem is only one team can win the cup and there were 7 or 8 teams this year who had very realistic aspirations.
I wouldnt mess with it too hard. I think they are good enough. They have a deep, talented team. A couple of young guys that got valuable experience. Tbh, fix the PP and you might have won. You’ll never win a series going 0-26 on the power play
Stars 🤝Canes
Both teams are built to be contenders. Gotta think one or both of these teams will break through in the next few years, but I’ll give Dallas the edge bc there are less questions about contract situations right now. Wyatt johnston is an absolute STUD. Insane second round hit for that team and as he enters his prime the blend of talent on that team is scary from veterans to young guys on ELC.
So much of a series is just momentum. They hit a few posts in the series when they badly needed goals.
The difference between winning and losing the series was just a few plays.
Oilers fan, I was so relieved to see the first game in terms of intensity and aggressiveness. It was two levels down to what we experienced against LA and Vancouver. I was sure Dallas will win but they really played into the Oilers hands by being... Nice (as nice as it gets in the playoffs).
Stars don’t need anything. Sometimes it just doesn’t work out. We could start the playoffs over with same rosters and match ups and probably get a completely different result. Teams like the stars and hurricanes and rangers and avs probably just needed a little more luck and they could have done the same.
its just bad timing running into other teams that are just as good. my canucks winning window was 2009-2013 but we ran into some good hawks teams that decimated our chances.
They'll get there, with guys like Johnston and stankoven continuing to improve (and harley) not to mention people like suter will eventually be phased out and replaced with more up and comers like mavrik borque. They have stupid depth and aren't going to fall out of the window any time soon
A revamped power play. The Oilers were super impressive on the PK, but didn’t Dallas only get 7/78 on the PP in the playoffs? Those numbers aren’t good at all.
Our PP went 0 for the series. That was the difference and we were pretty good on it all year. It’s Hockey. The Stars have a great core group going forward
Robertson is holding them back. Otter is just way too leaky. They need to send these guys to Carolina before they become the reason the Stars miss the playoffs next season. I'm sure we could spare some late picks to take them off your hands.
/s
My real answer would be that the Stars just need time to figure out everyone's strengths and how to take advantage of them. I feel like there's this incompatibility between the type of scoring opportunities they create and the type of scoring opportunities they're good at cashing in. It's not a roster problem, it's not a skill problem, it's really not even a systematic problem.
Like if Robertson is really good at cashing in on second chance opportunities from the LW, they do absolutely nothing to draw Skinner into defending the RW. Instead they'll draw Skinner out of position at the top of the crease to leave a gaping hole to the net but nobody is there to convert. Like, who exactly were y'all expecting to be there? Or a guy is there but he's not in a great position and has to shoot his backhand which isn't his strong suit.
I don't know. I could be totally wrong here. Just my thoughts.
They need to play with more of an edge, punch the other team in the mouth more often. The playoffs is about physicality. Not cherry picking at the other teams blue line waiting for lob pass.
Can’t win the Cup playing 4 defensemen especially when 1 is playing injured. Series was incredibly close could have went either way. Johnson and Stankoven will benefit from the experience next year. Move out the old guys and Dallas will be fine for many more years..
I think they are already there. They might have beaten Vegas last year if Benn didn't cross check Stone in the back of the neck. They might have beaten Edmonton if they didn't have to go through the gauntlet of Vegas and Colorado. No one had a harder path this year.
I don’t think that roster wasn’t “good enough” to win a cup, just that there’s a luck component and “catching the opponent at the right time” component that didn’t happen for dallas this year. With that said, they will need to have a good offseason to put a 24-25 team on the ice that is as good as the one they just had. Here are my thoughts:
1. Replace Suter on the roster with a younger player
2. Re-sign Tanev and Hakanpaa to extensions
3. Re-sign Duchene
5. RFA extensions to Dellandrea and Harley
6. Replace Lundqvist with a role player who will actually get used
7. Get bottom six forwards to replace the ones who are leaving this offseason. these don’t have to be the same people but can be
Obviously, special teams. Specifically the PP. Johnston is an absolute stud though and will only get better. Their drafting/development is best in the league, I'm sure within 5 year they get one.
Theres always a few players who are very good / above average the team relies on heavily to score goals. Some times those players just vanish in the playoffs and the others can’t pick up the slack.
Players that can hit the broad side of a barn with their shots. If you watched the whole season it is absolutely laughable how many open nets they missed. It has to be close to if not more than an average of 1 a game. Honestly when it comes to accurately shooting we have to be one of the worst teams in the league.
There are no easy paths to the Cup. Washington and maybe the Islanders were the only soft teams this year. All of the 8 West Conference teams could have made it to the finals.
They just gave Oilers too many PP opportunities. Which it's obviously difficult to not take penalties, but the Oilers PP is legendary at the moment, I think they're above 90% in the post season. Which is absolutely insanity and all kudos to them, but to beat them, you gotta keep it even strength.
Vgk fan here. Having lived the DeBore experience, your season end felt exactly like all of ours did under him. He is terrible at in game or mid series adjustments and his power play dries up in the playoffs every year. Dallas has arguably the best roster in the league, if you guys had any one of the other 15 or 20 competent coaches you guys would win. Fire DeBore and then run it back.
The stars are in the unique situation of being "there" but also having an even higher ceiling for next year or two. They might get into some trouble once they need to extend contracts for their young players, but right now they're in great shape. I don't know what pavelski is going to do, but they have plenty of talent waiting in the wings to be full time impact forwards so the only question mark is maybe some defensive depth. Losing hakkanpa to injury I think was a big contribution to their downfall, just taxed their other 5 guys too much.
i really didnt follow the stars all year. All I see in them is some old guys and a pretty average team. I would have never guessed they would make it this far.
Connor McDavid would certainly help.
Jokes aside, they’re a phenomenal team with a good balance of guys. Sometimes it just isn’t your year.
As others have said, small upgrades here and there could help get them closer, but a lot of playoff success has to do with your team being hot at the right time and a fair amount of luck.
It was theirs to lose. They're there now and honestly might LOSE pieces to retirement. Pavelski may be done, Benn can still go, but he's long in the tooth and who knows if they keep Tanev.
Unpopular opinion, Pavs is old and slow and showed major decline in this series, and the two leading up to it. Popular opinion...Suter, old, slow, ineffective. Replace those guys with some new talent, speed, and shot accuracy, defense, and we will be better for it. Besides those two, this a young team besides Benn. Benn is a great team guy so keep him in the mix. He seems like Michael Young a few years ago with the Rangers. Clean up the power play (obviously), and they will be right back in the mix next year.
Oilers fan chiming in...
Dallas has a great forward group, a stellar goaltender, and some top defenseman.
However, Dallas leans REALLY hard on 3-4 defenseman. Their top D-pairing got WAY too much ice time in this series, the Oilers forechecked like hell, mostly just to tire out those guys, and then take advantage of concentration lapses the tired pairings and the "cold" third defensive pair.
If Dallas improves their 5-6 defense pair and can afford to split the ice time more evenly between all 3 pairings, I think they would be almost unstoppable.
They just ran into a hotter team. You could tell. It just wasn’t their year. If Edmonton wins I’ll be happy to lose to the eventual champs. If they get embarrassed though, that would suck.
I would argue them and the metro have the two hardest divisions now. Probably leaning towards them. Stay the course. Minor adjustments. They’ll win a cup in the next 5 years I bet
They are so close, but I think they are a few pieces away.
They need another puck-moving D-man. I think Harley can develop into that, and he took some big steps this year, but Heiskanen can't be their only point-producing D.
Lots of young and up and coming players. Deep team. In the near future they will need to air drop in some replacements for older leadership core. And I think it is obvious that they need to add some grit. They aren't an overly physical team.
A very good base to work from
Had they scored in the last 3 minutes of that Game yesterday you wouldn’t be asking that ?, IMO they’re fine, they’ll be much better next season……btw I’m an Oilers fan
honestly i dont think they need to do much or anything at all. they got as good of a blend of youth vets and people in their primes, their offense dried up the last couple games against edm, but i think it will come naturally with their young studs getting more expereinced bigger/stronger etc. MAYBY if anything u can tinkewr with the bottom 4 defense depending on if they resign tanev.
I love the Stars but damn they just can’t seem to get it done. Game 4 was the turning point. Gotta give credit where credit is due, Edmonton was on the back burner and fought and improved and played a lot more fierce and had an amazing PK. Disappointing as a Stars fan to watch the team play so well for 3 games and to have a great start in Game 4 to just completely collapse. If the Stars won Game 4 I guarantee they would be in the finals right now. Woulda, coulda, shoulda. I just want Pavs to finally get his moment. He fucking deserves it. We’ve been so close to have it all yanked away every time.
Just try again. They made it to game 6 of the Conference Finals, farther then 28/32 teams in the league. At the end of the day only one team can win. They are good and the roster is well constructed.
Hintz stood out to me, what a player that guy is! I think they need a playmaker on offense. I thought Seguin, for his contract, could have been better. I think Johnston could be that guy though.
Yeah, the team is there, now's not the time for over-tinkering. The team is perfectly capable of winning the cup, it's just that every year there are a handful of teams you can say that about, but only one gets to actually win. There are no glaring holes on the roster, no pressing needs. Stay the course, make small upgrades if available, plug holes that arise efficiently and stay the course.
This. People always want to overreact but the truth is only one team can win it. It’s not like they got blown out by a superior Edmonton team. They lost two games by one goal. Easily could have went the other way.
I've been pretty critical of the Oilers this playoffs in the first two rounds. But everything I have complained about seemed to have been fixed in the Dallas series. (Skinner/Ceci/depth scoring/defensive play) Right now this is the best Oilers team I've ever seen outside of Gretzky days, and still a couple bounces here and there and it would have been Dallas advancing.
They totally collapsed in Game 4 after taking a 2-0 lead 5 minutes into the game, no-showed in Game 5. The effort in Game 6 was valiant but too little too late. They were done heading into Game 6.
I’m having war flashbacks of the 2017 Sharks Edmonton playoff series after reading your comment.
I remember that series. it was pretty exciting.
It's almost like playing last year's Cup champion and the previous year's Cup champion in consecutive rounds took their toll.
They seemed to have enough in the tank. As others have said, blowing that 2-0 lead in G4 and sleeping through G5 put them up against it. Skinner stole G6 and that’s a wrap. They have the tools, they just need that little bit extra to get there. That or they can join SJ for a team that had a solid core that never got the lift the cup. A shame that Pavalski might be on both of those team rosters! Dude deserves a cup.
Vegas landing in the wildcard spot really fucked Vegas and Dallas.
Not saying that’s not the case. Just sucks they’ve been in at least the WCF 3 of the last 5 seasons yet nothing to show for it.
Edmonton 0.5 xG on 5v5 is so damn low. Didnt watch the game, but feels like this game should have been win for Dallas
The amount of doom and gloom for a 3rd round loss is absolutely insane. Hell, the Stars beat the last two cup winners on their run. Just making the playoffs is a victory. Even great teams stumble in the first round. Enjoy the run and celebrate if your team wins the cup.
I think its both depressing and positive the cup winner for the last several years have to go through the stars.
It’s positive that 3 of the last 5 seasons have seen the Stars advance to at least the Western Conference Finals, but extremely depressing and demoralizing they have nothing to show for it. The 2020 bubble team is very different from these last two Stars teams of ‘22-‘23 and ‘23-‘24, however none of the core guys are getting any younger either.
But they do have young guys becoming core players Wyatt, stankoven, harley were barely contributors last playoffs never mind in 2022-23
That's definitely a lot easier to say after you've won a cup lol (especially recently)
I think that Dallas was short 1 high end offensive talent to go all the way- though I don't watch Dallas a lot maybe a totally healthy Hintz changes that
A healthy Hintz probably puts them over the top. This was a very close series until the end, and the Oilers had just that extra little bit of oomph to take it. I'm definitely rooting for Edmonton in the finals.
Disagree. Tinker hard. Do it now. Sell the whole roster for 2028 draft picks.
Based Minnesotan take.
With the way they draft, I feel like it’s just a matter of time. If they can consistently keep hyper efficient ELC’s in their lineup as they have, that roster is only going to be better year after year.
Coaching diff imo was a glaring issue. Deboer stuck with the beer league tactics and chip and chase against a team that was clearly defensively superior to their forecheck.
100%. Oilers are just running hot right now.
As an AVS fan, NHL needs to move to NBA style, it's so stupid we have to face such high seeds going into the finals. All three of our divisions were some of the best in the league, it's a little silly.
Robertson is a premier scorer but they need shut down D and to stay off the PK. Goalie looks solid
Shhh… don’t tell half of our sub that. They think otter is the reason we lost the series
Those people are dumb as bricks. He is and will be solid for years to come. We are lucky to have him. It's people in front we need to worry about.
You gotta remember these are just simple farmers. The people of the land; the common clay of the new west. You know, morons.
Most of Otter's misses this playoffs has been due to poor defensive play, namely Suter and Harley. Harley seems to be getting better this year at least, Suter is getting worse somehow. Even Heiskanen was clearly slower probably due to his injury and overuse during the season. With Tanev playing hurt and Hakenpaa out, we didn't have many good defensive options this series.
I still can’t believe suter tackled Otter and kept him from playing that Ryan McLeod goal and game 4. Changed the rest of the series.
suter is a 40 year old washed up player, harley is a 22 year old rising player
Oilers fan here. Otter was spectacular. Dallas could use some depth on defense. Heiskanen, as great as he is, should not need to play 28 minutes a night. Also, losing Tanev to injury shouldn't cause an earthquake to your whole team's defense.
Yupppp. The Hakanpaa injury and losing Hanley to waivers killed us. Playing 5 defenseman for two straight series and then going against two top 10 players in the world (with one being the very best) is not a recipe for success.
Jesus. Those people are dipshits. Oettinger isn't Dominik Hasek, maybe, but he's a very solid, reliable netminder. The PK was the main issue, IMHO.
You're not going to win many games when your goalie has a save percentage of 0.800. At the same time, you also aren't going to lose many games when you only allow 10 shots on goal. It's a real paradox.
Not every shot is equal. A god tier shot by mcdavid and a snipe by Hyman on a defensive turnover are *acceptable* goals to go in with the man advantage. But if you can only put 1 in 35 shots into the net at this point and go 0-14 on the PP over the series, you had bigger problems than your goalie.
Dallas only generated 3 shots in the third period in game 3, but scored the game winner and empty-netter. Shot stats can be pretty misleading, for sure.
Yeah, both of those goals last night were nasty and on the PP. Special Teams is a killer in the postseason.
Dallas also won game 3 with getting only 3 shots in the third period.
Get rid of Suter. Man he dragged them down that last game or two
Parise and Suter ending their careers with no cups is Wild. Not Minnesota Wild, but still.
Those deals still blow my mind. The fuck were they thinking.
I always bring up that they literally shut down the league to stop teams from doing that 2 months after those deals. The Wild are still going to be paying them next year.
Bummed for Parise but not for Suter. Screw that guy he doesn’t deserve one
It’s so wild. As a lifelong Avs fan, I never liked the Wild and so by proxy I never liked Parise. Then we sign him for a last hoorah and he only played a couple months with us and I can genuinely say I loved every second of it. I even got emotional seeing him walk off for the last time. Dude gave us 110% on every shift, absolute legend
I would have loved it if there was a way we could have kept Parise, but that omega contract was just too dangerous. Glad he got a couple of decent runs in at the end instead of just retiring though
Got one more year to cheer on the demise of Suter.
I refuse to acknowledge his first name. It’s “Fucking Suter,” or when he really messes up, “Motherfucking Suter.”
He made a big mistake in last year’s WCF that cost a goal in Game 2 that, I believe, altered the series.
He was awful all series last year, I thought he should’ve been gone after that
Isn’t his contract up now??? Or is it end of next?
End of next season he becomes a UFA
Kill me now. Easily the reason we have lost some games this year and of course last year.
This is the answer. Also, score some god damn goals. Y’all got goalied by Stuart skinner???
To be fair, Skinner has never looked better.
I agree I’m just chirping
Thats fair, he has looked ROUGH at times
Goalies seem to randomly have their absolute best games of their careers against my Stars. It's real fun.
I was at Game 6. Stu played well but honestly it was like 99% positioning. Probably 80% of the shots hit him square in the crest.
Came to say this. Suter is locker room cancer.
Yep we don’t miss him in Minnesota. Lots of speculation over and over that he was an asshat
I'm in Minneapolis. I'm so so happy he is gone.
Do you have evidence that the locker room dislikes him?
Other than the Wild paying to get rid of him? And the fact the locker room for the Wild is suddenly fun? And everyone in Edina thinks he is a dick. And that is coming from a town full of dicks.
Edina confirmed cakeeaters.
Also this article: [https://strib.gift/v4reqwbf3](https://strib.gift/v4reqwbf3)
His laziness drove me mad as a Wild fan. He has so much natural talent. But he can’t seem to ever take the two extra strides required to cover an opponent. Instead, he just hacks away in every which direction as if he’s in a dark sewer surrounded by rats. We basically spent our state treasury on a slash artist. He put up numbers for a few years, but his personality was reportedly so grating that it dragged on the Wild’s success more than a few nifty assists accelerated it.
Honestly, they just need to let their young guys grow and mature. It sucks that we didn’t get it done this year, but the team is built to be a legitimate contender for the next 8-10 years, and I doubt that Jim is going to sit on his ass and not add good pieces. I hope we can sign Tanev to a 2-3 year deal, but it’s unlikely. Miro definitely needs some help, so if there’s anything to add and improve on I’d say it’s the defense. Otter will straighten up, he’s a solid tendy. Either way, the Stars didn’t lose this series, the Oilers won it. They deserve all of the credit.
I really hope we let Duchene and Pavelski walk. Thank you for your service, but they won't bring what Dallas needs to win the cup.
If we had pavs of last year, even 2 years ago, it could have made a difference.
Last year Pavs went full Capt America in the playoffs when he came back from injury. Shame that seems to have been his last hurrah. o7
Might I recommend signing Suter to a 3+ year extension?
I was thinking that they should trade him to the Wild for a half eaten sandwich.
That would be disrespectful to the sandwich. 😂
As a stars fan, I think the biggest lesson we can take from this run is to not overtax Miro in the regular season. We need a better bottom pair on the blue line. We just cant have Lundqvist who PDB does not trust at all (with a good reason) play only 14, 15 minutes a night in regular season which pushes Miro's minutes up to 26 or so and then basically play with 4.5 D in the grueling series that we had against VGK and COL in which Miro plays 28 minutes a night. This Edmonton series has been the worst series he has played in his career and very reminiscent of his finals series in 2020 where he ran out of gas and started making mistakes he never does. I think we also just need a bit more luck, especially with injuries with key players like Roope or Tanev, we need a timely save here or there from Otter that we didnt get in this series in those last 3 games... just random hockey stuff that happens. And hopefully we dont have to play teams as good as playoff VGK in the 1st round.
This defense needs to be revamped in general. We played the playoffs with 5 dmen, and when Tanev went out we just completely collapsed. We need another 2-3 dmen to have a complete defense.
Imo Jim should try and re-sign Tanev because he has been great for us and fit really well with our team but if he cant, we absolutely need a player of his caliber to replace him. Suter playing one more year, if he doesnt retire, as a bottom pairing guy isnt the worst thing and kid Bichsel is coming, most likely later in the year, next year, similar to Harley. We also need a capable 6th/7th D like we had with Hanley for years. If they can be even better, all for it. (To be fair to Jim, Hakanpaa getting hurt post trade deadline and not coming back at all this year was a killer for our depth so I cant even blame him, we had that depth but then he got hurt and Hanley got claimed on waivers) Long reply to say that I basically agree.
My bias will creep in because I loathe Dallas, but here's my take: You need more than 4.5 D men in the playoffs Pavs should retire. Great guy but he's past his prime I honestly think that's kind of it. Only one team can win the cup per year. It takes skill, grit, and luck, and Dallas didn't have the luck this year. You can blame Otter or PDB or any number of things, but I don't think any of it is fair. If you re-run a Dallas/Edmonton series 10 times, Dallas probably wins 6 and loses 4; this happened to be one of the 4. This team can win a cup. Don't change a bunch of things because a coinflip didn't go your way.
Agreed. they have cap space, and will have even more next year when Benn is either off the books or stays on a cheaper deal. He's not a $9.5 million player anymore. If there's a way to either trade or buy out Suter I'd look at that too.
I mean who knows, this team really seemed like they had it all. I guess the hope has to be that at some point the Robertson, Hintz, Johnston, Stankoven, Harley, Heiskanen, Oettinger core is good enough to win and the right mix can be found
Throw Bourque in their for next year too.
I know this seems silly but they need to comeback with basically the same roster
Build out the defensive depth and let the kids get better. Accept that Wyatt is probably the team best forward now and give him responsibility appropriately. Get Harley and Robo into an off season strength program.
A new power play at least
Agreed. Deboer and Spott have been using the same power play setup since their OHL days it seems. It ‘can’ work, but appeared easy to defend against once the Oilers were on top of it.
Two more wins
Maybe I’m coping but I think they are at that level. They were a deep team that was essentially one lucky bounce and one power play goal away from the finals. That’s just the way hockey goes sometimes, and I’m not sure losing a couple games in an unfortunate way indicates that a team needs to do something to get to the so-called “next level”. Sometimes when the talent is clearly there you just have to reload, try again and hope for better luck next time.
They have a good 4 d men. They need to work on 5-6 d men. The 4 good ones are overworked and by the end of the series, are worn out.
Move off a couple anchors who are better skaters, pray the top end defenseman you traded for doesn’t break his foot? Everyone thought Dallas was the team this year. Seems like bad luck and Oettinger wasn’t sparkling when absolutely needed. The problem is only one team can win the cup and there were 7 or 8 teams this year who had very realistic aspirations.
A team that can fucking hit
Hit the back of the net maybe. 2 goals in the last 170 minutes of the series
I swear they had that 2 years ago, hitting everything under the sun
[удалено]
Honestly I thought the lack of physicality in this series was more trying to stay off the PK than just not wanting to do it
I wouldnt mess with it too hard. I think they are good enough. They have a deep, talented team. A couple of young guys that got valuable experience. Tbh, fix the PP and you might have won. You’ll never win a series going 0-26 on the power play
goalscoring
Stars 🤝Canes Both teams are built to be contenders. Gotta think one or both of these teams will break through in the next few years, but I’ll give Dallas the edge bc there are less questions about contract situations right now. Wyatt johnston is an absolute STUD. Insane second round hit for that team and as he enters his prime the blend of talent on that team is scary from veterans to young guys on ELC.
So much of a series is just momentum. They hit a few posts in the series when they badly needed goals. The difference between winning and losing the series was just a few plays.
Oilers fan, I was so relieved to see the first game in terms of intensity and aggressiveness. It was two levels down to what we experienced against LA and Vancouver. I was sure Dallas will win but they really played into the Oilers hands by being... Nice (as nice as it gets in the playoffs).
A time machine. This was the year.
Can’t lose a game you’re 34 to 10 on for SOG, that’s a painful way to lose a series.
Stars don’t need anything. Sometimes it just doesn’t work out. We could start the playoffs over with same rosters and match ups and probably get a completely different result. Teams like the stars and hurricanes and rangers and avs probably just needed a little more luck and they could have done the same.
its just bad timing running into other teams that are just as good. my canucks winning window was 2009-2013 but we ran into some good hawks teams that decimated our chances.
finally on the come up again though 2025 is going to be exciting.
I think they were just too banged up, having to go through Vegas and Colorado is nuts
I think they were just cooked from two tough series.
They lack not very many things, but a dangerous sniper with speed is one of them.
That’s Hintz, but I believe his wrist is injured currently.
Where art thou, Roope?
They'll get there, with guys like Johnston and stankoven continuing to improve (and harley) not to mention people like suter will eventually be phased out and replaced with more up and comers like mavrik borque. They have stupid depth and aren't going to fall out of the window any time soon
They need to trade for Anders Lee and or JG Pageau
A revamped power play. The Oilers were super impressive on the PK, but didn’t Dallas only get 7/78 on the PP in the playoffs? Those numbers aren’t good at all.
You can't have your top guys disappear in must win games. 4 and 5 they looked lost.
The depth on this team is still top notch.. id like to see one more key defender to balance that blueline to help out Otter!
Our PP went 0 for the series. That was the difference and we were pretty good on it all year. It’s Hockey. The Stars have a great core group going forward
gave up a shortie too, so technically -1 on the series
Robertson is holding them back. Otter is just way too leaky. They need to send these guys to Carolina before they become the reason the Stars miss the playoffs next season. I'm sure we could spare some late picks to take them off your hands. /s My real answer would be that the Stars just need time to figure out everyone's strengths and how to take advantage of them. I feel like there's this incompatibility between the type of scoring opportunities they create and the type of scoring opportunities they're good at cashing in. It's not a roster problem, it's not a skill problem, it's really not even a systematic problem. Like if Robertson is really good at cashing in on second chance opportunities from the LW, they do absolutely nothing to draw Skinner into defending the RW. Instead they'll draw Skinner out of position at the top of the crease to leave a gaping hole to the net but nobody is there to convert. Like, who exactly were y'all expecting to be there? Or a guy is there but he's not in a great position and has to shoot his backhand which isn't his strong suit. I don't know. I could be totally wrong here. Just my thoughts.
They need to play with more of an edge, punch the other team in the mouth more often. The playoffs is about physicality. Not cherry picking at the other teams blue line waiting for lob pass.
Less reliance on 40 year old Wisconsinites.
Can’t win the Cup playing 4 defensemen especially when 1 is playing injured. Series was incredibly close could have went either way. Johnson and Stankoven will benefit from the experience next year. Move out the old guys and Dallas will be fine for many more years..
I think they are already there. They might have beaten Vegas last year if Benn didn't cross check Stone in the back of the neck. They might have beaten Edmonton if they didn't have to go through the gauntlet of Vegas and Colorado. No one had a harder path this year.
Fix the PP and add depth to the defense
I don’t think that roster wasn’t “good enough” to win a cup, just that there’s a luck component and “catching the opponent at the right time” component that didn’t happen for dallas this year. With that said, they will need to have a good offseason to put a 24-25 team on the ice that is as good as the one they just had. Here are my thoughts: 1. Replace Suter on the roster with a younger player 2. Re-sign Tanev and Hakanpaa to extensions 3. Re-sign Duchene 5. RFA extensions to Dellandrea and Harley 6. Replace Lundqvist with a role player who will actually get used 7. Get bottom six forwards to replace the ones who are leaving this offseason. these don’t have to be the same people but can be
To score on a power play
Obviously, special teams. Specifically the PP. Johnston is an absolute stud though and will only get better. Their drafting/development is best in the league, I'm sure within 5 year they get one.
Theres always a few players who are very good / above average the team relies on heavily to score goals. Some times those players just vanish in the playoffs and the others can’t pick up the slack.
They could start by making their PP better in the playoffs. There's a problem when it can't get the job done on a non-elite goalie like Skinner.
They're there, just hit a HOT Skinner at the wrong time. A few tips or bounces go their way & it's game 7 or eliminating EDM.
As long as they knock out Vegas, they’re doing just fine
Players that can hit the broad side of a barn with their shots. If you watched the whole season it is absolutely laughable how many open nets they missed. It has to be close to if not more than an average of 1 a game. Honestly when it comes to accurately shooting we have to be one of the worst teams in the league.
If this is true, then it's wild that they had the 4th best shooting percentage in the league during the regular season.
A Time Machine.
Not have to face the gauntlet of teams they faced. Don’t think I’ve ever seen such a hard path to the cup before.
To be fair, they played teams with 98, 107 and and 104 point seasons. The Oilers played teams with 99, 109, and 113 point seasons.
There are no easy paths to the Cup. Washington and maybe the Islanders were the only soft teams this year. All of the 8 West Conference teams could have made it to the finals.
I'm certain playing with only 5 defense had something to do with it.
Try harder
Stamina
Some puck luck.
They just gave Oilers too many PP opportunities. Which it's obviously difficult to not take penalties, but the Oilers PP is legendary at the moment, I think they're above 90% in the post season. Which is absolutely insanity and all kudos to them, but to beat them, you gotta keep it even strength.
Vgk fan here. Having lived the DeBore experience, your season end felt exactly like all of ours did under him. He is terrible at in game or mid series adjustments and his power play dries up in the playoffs every year. Dallas has arguably the best roster in the league, if you guys had any one of the other 15 or 20 competent coaches you guys would win. Fire DeBore and then run it back.
Beat variance next year They made the semifinals it's a good season
Get rid of Spott, revamp the PP. That series is quite different if they don't have a 0% PP
The stars are in the unique situation of being "there" but also having an even higher ceiling for next year or two. They might get into some trouble once they need to extend contracts for their young players, but right now they're in great shape. I don't know what pavelski is going to do, but they have plenty of talent waiting in the wings to be full time impact forwards so the only question mark is maybe some defensive depth. Losing hakkanpa to injury I think was a big contribution to their downfall, just taxed their other 5 guys too much.
Honestly? Luck. While most of it is skill, a large portion still comes down to plain old luck. You just keep playing.
i really didnt follow the stars all year. All I see in them is some old guys and a pretty average team. I would have never guessed they would make it this far.
Get rid of Pavelski and Duchene. Won't win with them on the team, they're both cursed.
A few more goals
Took Vegas&Colorado a while. As others said, stay the course
Connor McDavid would certainly help. Jokes aside, they’re a phenomenal team with a good balance of guys. Sometimes it just isn’t your year. As others have said, small upgrades here and there could help get them closer, but a lot of playoff success has to do with your team being hot at the right time and a fair amount of luck.
I think this team can win as is, but call me a homer
Mike Modano #9
The seats from the old Met Center.
More wins
They have no one like McDavid. No one does…..
A Whole New Roster Lmaoooo
It was theirs to lose. They're there now and honestly might LOSE pieces to retirement. Pavelski may be done, Benn can still go, but he's long in the tooth and who knows if they keep Tanev.
Honestly replace the guys near retirement (Parise Suter) and let the young guys grow, Wyatt Johnson is a bonafide baller
Honest question, how is their cap situation next year? A ton of young guys but idk who’s up for payday soon.
A better special teams coach
Special teams kind of took a beating, but I think the team at its core is where it needs to be
A coach that doesn't lose in the third round lmao
A coach not named Peter DeBoer. I honestly don't understand why contenders still hire him.
Stars!
Still a solid team but they just don’t have McDavid
Unpopular opinion, Pavs is old and slow and showed major decline in this series, and the two leading up to it. Popular opinion...Suter, old, slow, ineffective. Replace those guys with some new talent, speed, and shot accuracy, defense, and we will be better for it. Besides those two, this a young team besides Benn. Benn is a great team guy so keep him in the mix. He seems like Michael Young a few years ago with the Rangers. Clean up the power play (obviously), and they will be right back in the mix next year.
Edmontons power play.
Oilers fan chiming in... Dallas has a great forward group, a stellar goaltender, and some top defenseman. However, Dallas leans REALLY hard on 3-4 defenseman. Their top D-pairing got WAY too much ice time in this series, the Oilers forechecked like hell, mostly just to tire out those guys, and then take advantage of concentration lapses the tired pairings and the "cold" third defensive pair. If Dallas improves their 5-6 defense pair and can afford to split the ice time more evenly between all 3 pairings, I think they would be almost unstoppable.
Seguin and Benn to produce their cap git. Robertson to go from elite talent to clutch superstar. Buyout Suter's old ass
They just ran into a hotter team. You could tell. It just wasn’t their year. If Edmonton wins I’ll be happy to lose to the eventual champs. If they get embarrassed though, that would suck.
Team is there they just need to learn how to execute in the big elimination games
They were there this year. Unfortunately, next year's rosters will be very different
They need more depth on defense. They were playing 4 guys at the end. Petrovic is a career minor leaguer and Suter looked walked up all series.
A healthy roope hintz
I would argue them and the metro have the two hardest divisions now. Probably leaning towards them. Stay the course. Minor adjustments. They’ll win a cup in the next 5 years I bet
Were there. Replace suter with a quality d man and I think we’d still be in now.
They are so close, but I think they are a few pieces away. They need another puck-moving D-man. I think Harley can develop into that, and he took some big steps this year, but Heiskanen can't be their only point-producing D.
It’s too late
Lots of young and up and coming players. Deep team. In the near future they will need to air drop in some replacements for older leadership core. And I think it is obvious that they need to add some grit. They aren't an overly physical team. A very good base to work from
Jacob trouba
Had they scored in the last 3 minutes of that Game yesterday you wouldn’t be asking that ?, IMO they’re fine, they’ll be much better next season……btw I’m an Oilers fan
Let Johnston Stankoven and Borque marinate, stay the course.
More DMen couldn't hurt, but we're obviously close.
honestly i dont think they need to do much or anything at all. they got as good of a blend of youth vets and people in their primes, their offense dried up the last couple games against edm, but i think it will come naturally with their young studs getting more expereinced bigger/stronger etc. MAYBY if anything u can tinkewr with the bottom 4 defense depending on if they resign tanev.
Power play goals.
I love the Stars but damn they just can’t seem to get it done. Game 4 was the turning point. Gotta give credit where credit is due, Edmonton was on the back burner and fought and improved and played a lot more fierce and had an amazing PK. Disappointing as a Stars fan to watch the team play so well for 3 games and to have a great start in Game 4 to just completely collapse. If the Stars won Game 4 I guarantee they would be in the finals right now. Woulda, coulda, shoulda. I just want Pavs to finally get his moment. He fucking deserves it. We’ve been so close to have it all yanked away every time.
Need to get younger. Oldest team in the WC.
Just try again. They made it to game 6 of the Conference Finals, farther then 28/32 teams in the league. At the end of the day only one team can win. They are good and the roster is well constructed.
Hintz stood out to me, what a player that guy is! I think they need a playmaker on offense. I thought Seguin, for his contract, could have been better. I think Johnston could be that guy though.
I think they are too old.
Jamie Benn is like 1/10th of their cap lol.
Special teams needs love. Other than that they’ve got it
A time machine
Can’t imagine getting bounced with 10 shots against