Stars center Roope Hintz has fully recovered from the broken foot he sustained late in the playoffs, relays NHL.com’s Tracey Myers. The injury ultimately didn’t need surgery and he will be ready to take part in training camp next month. Hintz came back for the final two games of the series before Dallas was eliminated by Edmonton but he was clearly not at his best given the injury. He finished fourth on the Stars in scoring last season after putting up 28 goals and 39 assists in 76 games while adding a dozen points in 17 postseason appearances. It was the first time in four years that he didn’t reach the 30-goal mark, something he might have been able to reach had he been fully healthy during the regular season.
Stars Rumors
Gulutzan Focused On Making Stars More Physical
The Dallas Stars are in the midst of a frustrating streak. They’ve lost in the Western Conference Finals in each of the last three seasons, including back-to-back losses at the hands of the Edmonton Oilers. In an effort to curb their bad luck, Dallas went directly to the source to fill their head coaching vacancy earlier this summer. They hired Oilers assistant Glen Gulutzan, who brings the sharp assessment of Dallas’ roster that only a Conference rival could have. In an interview with Sean Shapiro of the Dallas Magazine, Gulutzan shared that his key focus for the 2025-26 Stars will be playing more physical.
Gulutzan’s critique of Dallas’ style certainly lands at a good time. The Stars delivered the fewest hits in the league, at even-strength, last season (1,160 total hits). They were also on the receiving end of more hits than any other club (1,963 total hits received). It was the second-straight season that Dallas ranked dead-last in the NHL in terms of hits-given versus hits-received – but Gulutzan’s urge to address that weakness won’t take too much improvement. The Oilers have also been among the league’s most out-hit clubs, ranking second-to-last in the 2024-25 season and fifth-to-last in 2023-24.
Even with that standing, Gulutzan acknowledged how much a dash of physicality transformed the Oilers. He pointed directly to the growth of Connor McDavid and Leon Draisaitl over the last two seasons. McDavid recorded a career-high 118 hits in the 2023-24 season, while Draisaitl reached 58 hits, the second-highest mark of his career. Both players took a major step back in hits this season – McDavid recording just 40, and Draisaitl recording 23 – but star talent leaning into the physical game clearly inspired the Oilers lineup. Gulutzan told Shapiro:
You had to ask the elite players to use their skills and smarts to check, not to deliver big body checks, but to check and add a little physicality each shift… And the reality is that’s the evolution of that group. It happened because [McDavid and Draisitl] wanted it to happen, and reinforced it for everyone. I look at our team [in Dallas]. I’m putting the energy in the same spot
To their credit, Dallas does have their fair share of bruisers at the top of the lineup. Rookie Lian Bichsel managed an incredible 155 hits in just 38 games last season, confidently leading all NHL defensemen in hits-per-60 minutes played. The Stars also continue to receive heavy physicality from captain Jamie Benn, who has recorded at least 100 hits in three of the last four seasons – and 97 hits in his sole off-year. But Gulutzan will ask for more out of the rest of the team’s stars – a group likely to include Jason Robertson, Roope Hintz, Mikko Rantanen and Wyatt Johnston who managed 60, 53, 48, and 45 hits last season respectively.
A new brand of physicality could be the piece that pushes Dallas past their Western Conference foes. The Florida Panthers just won back-to-back Stanley Cups on the heels of high-pressure forechecking opening ground for their star scorers. That will be the mantra Dallas looks to adopt under new head coach Gulutzan, as they look to pave their way past the Western Conference for the first time since 2020 next season.
Bichsel Looking For Extended Role
With the Dallas Stars parting ways with veterans Cody Ceci, Mathew Dumba and Brendan Smith, the door is fully open for 21-year-old defender Lian Bichsel to make a full impact on the blue line this season, per NHL.com’s Mike Heika.
Last season, during his rookie year, Bichsel, the Stars’ first-round pick in the 2022 draft (18th overall), appeared in 38 games, recording nine points, 23 blocked shots, and a team-leading 155 hits. The hulking 6’7″, 230-pound defenseman also suited up for 18 playoff games, contributing one assist and adding 75 more hits. His 16.4 hits per 60 minutes last season was nearly 10 higher than the second-place finisher (Colin Blackwell with 6.9).
A native of Switzerland, Bichsel appeared in the Swedish Hockey League for three seasons before coming over to North America, and worked his way into Dallas’ lineup in short order. And as Heika notes, Bichsel could slot into a variety of pairings on the Stars’ third defensive unit, but skating alongside veteran Alexander Petrovic would give him a steady, experienced presence. The two also have experience playing as a pairing in the AHL.
Stars Sign Nathan Bastian
The Stars have added some depth on the wing as the team announced that they’ve signed Nathan Bastian to a one-year, one-way contract. The agreement will pay the league minimum of $775K. GM Jim Nill released the following statement:
Nathan will add forward depth and a physical presence to our lineup, both of which will be valuable to our organization. We’re looking forward to watching him take the next step of his career with the Stars and are excited to welcome him to Dallas.
The 27-year-old has parts of six NHL seasons under his belt, most of which came with New Jersey, which drafted him in the second round back in 2016. Before now, his only time away from the Devils since that time came when Seattle selected him in the 2021 Expansion Draft but just two months later, the Kraken waived Bastian with New Jersey quickly reclaiming him.
Last season, Bastian played in 59 games for the Devils, picking up four goals and six assists along with 138 hits in just under 11 minutes per night of playing time. That stat line lines up with most of his seasons as he has yet to reach 20 points in a single year while he has only hit the double-digit mark in goals once, that coming back in 2021-22. However, he averages 223 hits per 82 games played, giving the Stars some extra physicality in their lineup.
Dallas has largely stayed quiet as expected in free agency this season with the bulk of their moves coming from either re-signing players or making trades. As things stand, he’s likely to battle with Oskar Back and Colin Blackwell for playing time on the fourth line while starting out as the 13th forward is a realistic outcome as well.
At the moment, the Stars project to be very tight against the salary cap with a 23-player roster coming in just a few hundred thousand below the Upper Limit, per PuckPedia. Accordingly, this could very well be it for their free agent moves with a big chunk of their roster from last season’s run to the Western Conference Final returning as from here on out, any addition will require money coming off their books as well.
Stars’ Brandon Gorzynski Commits To Arizona State University
Brandon Gorzynski, the recent draft pick of the Dallas Stars, announced his collegiate commitment on Instagram. Starting in the 2026-27 NCAA season, Gorzynski will continue his development at Arizona State University.
Gorzynski was selected 126th overall by the Stars in the 2025 NHL Draft. Despite being drafted in the fourth round, he was Dallas’ second-highest selection in this summer’s draft, given how much draft capital they’ve traded over the past few years in their competitive window.
The native of Scottsdale, AZ, played for the WHL’s Calgary Hitmen last year and will return to the team for the 2025-26 season. As one of the youngest players on the roster, he finished sixth on the team in scoring with 17 goals and 42 points in 68 games, with a +27 rating. He also produced well in the WHL playoffs, scoring four goals and eight points in 11 postseason contests.
Despite being on a team that has only appeared in the National Tournament once (2019), Gorzynski will join one of the most competitive collegiate conferences in the sport. The Sun Devils have played in the National Collegiate Hockey Conference (NCHC) since the start of last season. It’s home to the two most recent Frozen Four champions, the University of Denver Pioneers and the Western Michigan University Broncos.
In their first season outside of being an independent team, Arizona State finished second in the conference with a 14-9-1-2-5 record in 24 games, finishing 10 points back of the Broncos. In the conference tournament, despite earning an opening game win against the University of Minnesota Duluth, they were dispatched in the next game by the Pioneers.
Snapshots: Heiskanen, Peddle, Penguins
The Stars will have a fully healthy and fully confident Miro Heiskanen atop their blue line when training camp begins next month, the defender told NHL Finland’s Varpu Sihvonen.
“My confidence is back where it used to be now that my knee can take all the practice and feels fine,” Heiskanen said. He told Sihvonen that his training schedule this summer has been normal after missing most of the back half of the season with a knee injury, only returning to action in time for the late stages of their second-round series against the Jets. The 26-year-old cornerstone had four points in eight postseason games upon returning, but saw a reduced workload at 21:49 per game.
Heiskanen was amid something of a down year offensively before his injury with 25 points in 50 games, but he’d operated at a 69-point pace over the previous two years with a pair of top-10 Norris Trophy finishes to show for it. With cap constraints thinning out Dallas’ defensive depth behind its big three of Heiskanen, Thomas Harley, and Esa Lindell, they’ll need him back at his peak to have aspirations of a fourth straight Western Conference Final appearance in 2026 – hopefully, this time with a Stanley Cup Final appearance to show for it.
More from around the league:
- Now-former Blue Jackets prospect Tyler Peddle has been traded in the QMJHL. He’s headed to the Charlottetown Islanders in exchange for a pair of draft picks, the team announced. He was the last pick of the 2023 draft but was not signed by June 1 of this year, making him an unrestricted free agent. He’ll hope for a strong overage season on Prince Edward Island to help him land an NHL or AHL contract next offseason. The 20-year-old center only had a 15-14–29 scoring line with a -34 rating in 54 games for the Saint John Sea Dogs last season, and his production has declined steadily since he peaked with 41 points in 64 games during his draft year for Drummondville.
- There’s been no significant traction on talks regarding any of the Penguins’ major trade chips in Erik Karlsson, Rickard Rakell, and Bryan Rust, Elliotte Friedman of Sportsnet said on last weekend’s 32 Thoughts podcast. Friedman added there’s still potential for those discussions to heat up near the end of the month or closer to training camp, but no big moves are imminent.
Joe Nieuwendyk, Ralph Strangis Elected To Stars' HOF
- According to a team announcement, the Dallas Stars have elected Joe Nieuwendyk and Ralph Strangis to their organizational Hall of Fame. Nieuwendyk spent seven years as a Star, scoring 178 goals and 340 points in 442 games, helping the team to their first and only Stanley Cup championship in 1999. Meanwhile, Strangis began his broadcasting career with the Minnesota North Stars and remained with the team when they relocated to Dallas. He retired after the 2014-15 NHL season.
[SOURCE LINK]
Stars Hire David Pelletier As Assistant Coach
The Stars have named longtime Oilers skating coach David Pelletier as an assistant on Glen Gulutzan’s staff, per a team announcement Friday.
It’s not the 50-year-old’s first NHL job. He’s worked in the Edmonton area as a skating coach for the last decade, also working as a skills coach for the WHL’s Edmonton Oil Kings since 2020-21 and as an assistant coach for the University of Alberta program from 2018-20.
Pelletier never played hockey at any level but is a well-known pairs figure skater, winning gold for Canada at the 2002 Winter Olympics. The team said Pelletier will not be on the team’s bench during games and will instead serve as an “eye-in-the-sky” assistant.
Dallas’ coaching turnover is now complete. After firing head coach Peter DeBoer and losing assistants Misha Donskov and Steve Spott to other roles, they’ve brought in Gulutzan as head coach and named Pelletier and Neil Graham as new assistants. Alain Nasreddine still remains from last year’s staff and will serve as the bench group with Gulutzan and Graham during games.
Pelletier is also a member of the Canadian Olympic and Sports Hall of Fame and was awarded the Lou Marsh Trophy, given to the most outstanding Canadian athlete, in 2001. He was part of the Oil Kings staff that guided the team to a WHL championship in 2022, a roster that included NHLers Sebastian Cossa, Dylan Guenther, Kaiden Guhle, Jake Neighbours, and Justin Sourdif.
Stars Trade Matt Dumba To Penguins
The Stars are trading defenseman Matt Dumba and their 2028 second-round pick to the Penguins in exchange for defenseman Vladislav Kolyachonok, reports Elliotte Friedman of Sportsnet. Both teams have since announced the trade, which doesn’t include any salary retention.
Completing the deal will make the Stars cap-compliant for the 2025-26 season. Even if Dallas has Kolyachonok on its opening night roster, he costs the league minimum $775K against the cap.
That’s $2.975MM less than Dumba’s $3.75MM cap hit, since Pittsburgh takes on the totality of his salary with no retention on Dallas’ part. That savings puts Dallas, which is currently $1.79MM above the upper limit, back under the cap.
The Stars signed Dumba to a two-year, $7.5MM contract in free agency last summer, viewed as a risky commitment at the time after the 6’1″ righty had just 12 points and a -18 rating in 76 games with the Coyotes and Lightning the year prior. The fears around the contract were quickly realized. Dumba, who turns 31 later this month, had negative possession impacts everywhere he was deployed and was out of the lineup entirely by the time the postseason rolled around.
Dumba played 63 games for the Stars last season, averaging just 15:18 per game with a 1-9–10 scoring line. He logged a minus-five rating in what amounted to his lowest usage since his rookie campaign and was a healthy scratch for all 18 playoff games.
The best years of Dumba’s NHL career came as a top-pairing piece for the Wild, who drafted him No. 7 overall in 2012. He remained there through the beginning of his steep decline in the early 2020s, leaving for Arizona in 2023 in free agency on a one-year contract. After failing to re-establish his value there, he was flipped to the Lightning at the trade deadline for two late-round picks and finished out the year as a bottom-pairing piece in Tampa before signing in Dallas in the offseason.
Dumba’s best season came back in 2017-18 as a 23-year-old, when he finished 19th in the league in scoring among defensemen with 50 points in 82 games and tied for 10th with 14 goals. He also had 12 goals and 22 points in just 32 games the following year before an upper-body injury ended his season. His offensive production never recovered, averaging just 22.4 points per 82 games since returning.
It’s unclear if Dumba will have much of a role in Pittsburgh’s lineup next season. They have three right-shot defenders ahead of him on the depth chart in Connor Clifton, Erik Karlsson, and Kris Letang, although Karlsson is well-known trade bait this summer. If he remains in the picture, though, Dumba could start the season in the press box – or even on waivers and buried in the minors – unless someone shifts to their offside.
Dumba’s price tag is exceedingly steep for the No. 6/7/8 defender he is at this stage of his career, one Dallas simply couldn’t afford to shoulder with their cap crunch after extending Mikko Rantanen and retaining UFAs Jamie Benn and Matt Duchene. They part with a second-round pick to wipe his deal off the books one year early – a steep price considering the market for cap dumps this summer, although they do well in acquiring a serviceable depth piece in Kolyachonok. They’re now without a pick before the third round in 2028.
The Penguins already had a bit of a crunch among depth defensemen after signing Alexander Alexeyev, Caleb Jones, and Parker Wotherspoon in free agency. It isn’t surprising to see them unwilling to take on a defenseman without moving one out.
They picked up Kolyachonok, a 24-year-old 6’2″ lefty with some untapped two-way potential, off waivers from Utah in February last season. He didn’t get into much game action, though, recording two assists and a minus-five rating in 12 appearances while averaging 14:20 per game. There wasn’t going to be much opportunity for him in Pittsburgh with their aforementioned additions and younger, higher-profile names like Owen Pickering pushing for more NHL ice time.
Kolyachonok, a second-rounder in 2019, has 14 points in 74 career NHL games with a minus-seven rating and 72 hits. He’ll presumably compete with veteran Alexander Petrovic to exit training camp as the extra defenseman on the NHL roster.
Sean Shapiro of DLLS Sports was first to report the Stars and Penguins were working on a trade centered around Dumba and Kolyachonok.
Image courtesy of Jerome Miron-Imagn Images.
Stars Re-Sign Antonio Stranges
The Stars have signed restricted free agent forward Antonio Stranges to a one-year deal, his agent, Gold Star Hockey’s Dan Milstein, announced Wednesday on X. PuckPedia reports it’s a two-way deal worth $775K in the NHL and $100K in the AHL.
Stranges, 23, was a fourth-round pick by Dallas in the 2020 draft. The skilled but inconsistent left-winger signed his entry-level contract near the end of his final junior season with the OHL’s London Knights in 2022.
The Michigan native’s development since turning pro in earnest three years ago has followed a linear track. He split an injury-plagued 2022-23 season between AHL Texas and ECHL Idaho, producing well at both levels when healthy. He’s stuck around in the AHL since, posting 23 games in 55 games two years ago before breaking out for an 18-25–43 scoring line in 55 games last season.
He’s still got a ways to go to prove he can be consistent enough of a scoring presence for a potential third-line role in Dallas down the line. He’s likely not a candidate to crack the opening night roster in the fall, but he will need to clear waivers if the Stars want to send him back to the minors. Another step forward in Texas in 2025-26 could put him in line for a one-way contract and an NHL job in 2026-27.
Despite his loads of professional experience, Stranges will again be a restricted free agent next summer, assuming the Stars choose to extend a qualifying offer to him again. He’ll still be too young to qualify for Group VI unrestricted free agent status.