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Christian Kyrou

Stars Activate Mason Marchment From Injured Reserve

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Stars winger Mason Marchment has been activated from injured reserve Sunday, per a team announcement. The team opened roster space by reassigning forward Kyle McDonald and defenseman Christian Kyrou to AHL Texas, leaving them with an open spot.

Marchment, 29, will draw into the lineup this evening for the first time in over a month. The power forward needed surgery after taking a puck to the face against the Wild on Dec. 27, keeping him out of Dallas’ last 17 games.

The Ontario native was having an extraordinarily productive campaign before his injury. He had 12 goals and 15 assists for 27 points through the season’s first 33 games, still placing him fifth on the team in points per game with 0.82. He’s on track for his best offensive season as a Star and his finest showing since his breakout 2021-22 campaign with the Panthers, when he notched a +29 rating and 47 points in 54 games and finished 18th in Selke Trophy voting.

Marchment is now in the third season of the four-year, $18MM deal he inked with Dallas in free agency in 2022. He has 111 points in 182 games as a Star, ranking ninth on the team in scoring since his arrival and ranking third in hits (240).

A career-high 15.0% shooting rate explains some of Marchment’s re-emergence as a bonafide top-six piece, but he’s also recorded figures in the 14% range twice in his six-year NHL career. His possession impacts this season have also been standouts, ranking second on the team behind Mavrik Bourque with a 55.5 CF% at even strength.

He’s another weapon in a Stars offense that’s figured things out in recent weeks, ranking fifth in the league with 3.29 goals per game in Marchment’s absence. His return to the lineup should coincide with Mikael Granlund’s Dallas debut after they acquired him from the Sharks yesterday, supercharging their already strong offensive depth.

McDonald and Kyrou were recalled yesterday as the Stars entered long-term injured reserve for the first time this season. Neither was ever expected to play, with their cap hits solely being added to the active roster to optimize their LTIR capture when they moved Tyler Seguin there and added Nils Lundkvist after news broke that the latter would miss the remainder of the season with an upper-body injury.

Stars Announce Several Roster Moves; Nils Lundkvist Out For The Season

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It’s a busy Saturday in Dallas.  The team announced (Twitter link) that defenseman Kyle Capobianco has been assigned to AHL Texas while blueliner Christian Kyrou and winger Kyle McDonald from AHL Texas.  To make room on the roster, winger Mason Marchment was placed on injured reserve.  The team then revealed that defenseman Nils Lundkvist has undergone season-ending shoulder surgery and that he and Tyler Seguin have been placed on LTIR.

Capobianco made his season debut on Friday and had some early struggles in his first taste of NHL action in two years.  The 27-year-old has been quite productive with Texas, however, tallying 28 points in 35 games.  Depending on how the back end of these roster moves shuffle out, it’s possible that Capobianco is back with the big club pretty quickly.

It’s the first regular season recall for both Kyrou and McDonald.  On the surface, they may be short-lived ones as it’s likely those moves were made to optimize their LTIR placements.  Kyrou has 13 points in 26 games with Texas in his sophomore year professionally.  McDonald, meanwhile, has just five points in 31 appearances, a big drop after picking up 26 points in 51 outings last season.

Marchment has been out since late December due to a facial injury.  Assuming the Stars filed the paperwork to make his placement retroactive, he can be activated at any time and is believed to be aiming to return before the upcoming break so he might not be out for much longer.  He was off to a strong start before the injury with 12 goals and 15 assists in his first 33 outings.

As for Lundkvist, he had missed the last week and a half with an upper-body injury which we now know was a shoulder issue.  His season comes to an end on a pretty quiet note as he finishes with five assists, 34 blocks, and 23 hits in 39 games while averaging just over 15 minutes a night.  He joins blueliner Miro Heiskanen on the shelf as Dallas’ defensive depth starts to get tested.

The 24-year-old is slated to be a restricted free agent with arbitration rights this summer where he’ll be owed a $1.25MM qualifying offer.  Dallas declined to tender him last summer when the qualifier was only $874K to avoid giving him arbitration rights so it wouldn’t be surprising if they go that route again if a deal can’t be reached before the end of June.

Seguin, meanwhile, underwent hip surgery back in December, a procedure that carried an expected recovery timeline of four to six months although it’s expected he won’t be back until the playoffs.

Accordingly, by placing both him and Lundkvist on LTIR, Dallas can exceed the cap by up to the amount of their cap hits minus any remaining regular cap room at the time of placement.  (Kyrou and McDonald’s recalls allow them to reduce that regular cap room as much as possible to maximize how much LTIR space they have).  All things considered, Dallas should have somewhere around $11MM in full-season contracts that they can add between now and the March 7th trade deadline, making the Stars a team to watch for in the coming weeks.

Dallas Stars Sign Christian Kyrou

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The Dallas Stars have announced that they have signed prospect defenseman Christian Kyrou to a three-year entry-level contract. Per the team announcement, the contract will begin next season.

Kyrou, the brother of St. Louis Blues star Jordan Kyrou, currently plays in the OHL for the Sarnia Sting, having been traded there earlier this year from the Erie Otters. Kyrou was the 50th overall pick in last year’s draft after a draft season where he scored 60 points in 68 games.

This season, Kyrou has scored 67 points in 56 games across both teams. He’s the fifth-ranked prospect in the Stars’ system according to The Athletic’s Scott Wheeler, (subscription link) and has drawn praise for his high skill level and offensive ability.

Kyrou was born September 15th 2003, meaning he missed the cutoff for eligibility for the 2021 draft by just a day. That may have worked quite a bit in his favor, though, as he missed the entire 2020-21 season due to the COVID-19 pandemic, which wiped out the OHL’s season. Additionally, the NHL-CHL transfer agreement stipulates that CHL prospects aged 20 or older by December 31st are eligible for assignment to the American Hockey League that season.

Since Kyrou will turn 20 in the middle of September next season, the Stars could have the option to send him to their AHL affiliate, the Texas Stars, rather than have him play another season in the OHL.

He could also, of course, make the Stars out of training camp, but that seems relatively unlikely seeing as the Stars already have 2019 first-round pick Thomas Harley eager to claim a spot on the left side of their defense, as well as Miro Heiskanen, Esa Lindell, and Ryan Suter already on the roster as established left-shot options.

The Stars had a two-year window to sign Kyrou to an entry-level deal before he would be eligible to re-enter the draft,  but such a possibility was quickly taken out of the picture by Kyrou’s stellar performance in the OHL. He’s a promising young defenseman and his official entry into the Stars organization should be cause for excitement among Dallas fans.

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