Season Review: Dallas Stars

Well, now that people are talking playoffs, I will be reviewing the seasons of teams as they're either eliminated from the playoffs or eliminated from playoff contention before the end of the season. Obviously, the last team reviewed will be the one that wins the Cup.

Now the next team to be eliminated from playoff contention: The Dallas Stars.

Season expectations: After reaching the Western Conference Finals in 2008, the team completely missed the postseason the following year. Much of that had been blamed on the Sean Avery "sloppy seconds" controversy when it actuality it was the play of Marty Turco that was hurting the squad. To be completely fair, the team let go of both Dan Ellis and Mike Smith and gave the backup job to a guy who now plays in his native Switzerland. Now, Brett Hull stepped down as GM and new GM Joe Nieuwendyk stepped in and was set to make the team better...

... but he made the decision to fire coach Dave Tippett in favor of Marc Crawford. Ask the Phoenix Coyotes how that's working out for them.

My prediction: I figured the team would be fourth in their division and 11th Overall in the Western Conference.

The truth: They became the fourth team in the Western Conference to be eliminated from playoff contention, so I wasn't far off the mark.

What went wrong?: You mean besides letting go of a coach who's now being considered for the Jack Adams trophy?

Too much firepower, not enough defense.

Case in point? Brad Richards has 90 points. He also has a -11 rating. Overall, there will be six players on the team who break the 40 point barrier (seven if Jamie Benn can get a point within the next few games) but those same guys couldn't be counted on to play defense as all but Benn will likely end up minus players at seasons' end. The same goes for the offensive d-men on the team too, as there wasn't much defensive firepower above Stephane Robidas' production. In the end, it was Mark Fistric's incredible +24 rating and the solid defensive play of their depth forwards that helped give Turco a shot at having a respectable season.

On a smaller level, any team that employs Steve Ott tends to get more penalties than other teams. I'm just saying...

It wasn't all doom-and gloom though, as Turco did bounce back despite the eventual end to the season. The team did bring in Kari Lehtonen as a new option and he's doing about as well as Turco is. If Turco and Lehtonen re-sign with Dallas in the off-season, then at least their goaltending will be properly addressed heading into next season.

So what's next?: Well, they could probably use another offensive d-man for next season, but really, they just need to have their scoring forwards to commit to playing a higher level of defense than they do already. Just make some smarter signings in the off-season and maybe they can do better than they did this season, though that's going to be very difficult in what's currently the NHL's best division.