Why Dallas's Cup Window Is Still Open (for Now)

One first round exit should not a crisis create

On The Fan yesterday, I was asked a question that I’ve seen bouncing around the Hockeysphere ever since Mark Lazerus mentioned it last week: are the Stars in danger of becoming the new¹ San Jose Sharks?

For the purposes of a radio hit, my answer was basically this: playoffs have some random elements, and you can never guarantee a championship. You buy a ticket to the tournament by playing well enough to get in each year, and then you hope one of those years hits.

It is, of course, more complex than that. Not all playoff teams have an equal chance to win it all. That’s particularly true with the current divisional format, which would have rewarded the Stars for playing worse in the regular season this year and finishing as a Wild Card team, as they could have then crossed over to start the playoffs in the Pacific Division playoff bracket, where they would have faced two teams who are worse than Minnesota or Colorado in the first two rounds.

Alas, the Stars instead finished as the second-best team in the West (and third-best in the NHL), and that meant any problems with the roster or its execution were likely to get exploited early. That’s exactly what happened, too: multiple injuries revealed less depth than in prior years, and their struggles to create a high volume of Grade-A scoring chances resulted in the even-strength scoring disparity we all spent two weeks bemoaning. Minnesota had more of their top players available, and they outplayed Dallas with the players both teams did have. Deservedly, Minnesota advanced² to the second round.

Even in those circumstances, however, a first-round exit leads to hard questions. And it should! Colorado had to face those exact same questions after Dallas bounced them a year ago, and they responded pretty well indeed. A longer summer break led to one of the hottest starts in NHL history, and the Avalanche still look pretty much a tier above everyone else in the league, Minnesota included.

(And considering that the Avalanche had the good fortune to avoid the Stars in the playoffs, they might actually have a chance of winning a Stanley Cup to cap it all off. That’s not to say Dallas would have beaten Colorado this year, but also, they totally would have beaten Colorado this year.)

To get back to that big question though, I wanted to outline why I don’t think the first-round exit means the Stars’ window has closed, but also why I think they’re not quite as far away from its closing as they might like to think.