Friday is here and we have less than six weeks left of the countdown! 41 days until the Dallas Stars open up their season against the Chicago Blackhawks on October 9th at the American Airlines Center.
I have made a bracket, one like you would see for the NBA or NHL playoffs, of the 16 best games of the Dallas Stars 2013-2014 regular season. I’m sure you will agree entirely with the 16 games I have chosen, and if not, then just play along and comment at the end with which one you feel should have been given a chance and won.
So, I will put a poll up for each of the next 15 days featuring one of the games, with a brief argument for why it should be considered. Then, you can go to the bottom and vote on which one you think deserves to move on to the next round. The poll will expire 24 hours after it is put up, just in time for the next bracket of games to be put up. The Sweet 16 has already ended and the final eight teams have moved on. At the end of the Elite 8, I will announce the winners of the entire round and start up the Final 4, and so on and so forth. Sound fun? If so, great! If not, oh well.
Yesterday, the second of four games went up, being the Dallas Stars @ Los Angeles Kings game on December 23rd facing off against the Minnesota Wild @ Dallas Stars game on March 8th.
TODAY’S MATCHUP: Dallas Stars @ Boston Bruins on November 5th VS. Pittsburgh Penguins @ Dallas Stars on January 25th
Dallas @ Boston, 3-2 F (SO):
This one was a barnburner for the books! With the Stars losing an early 1-0 lead and then falling in a 2-1 hole with less than 10 minutes to go, they needed a hero, and #38 turned out to be the desirable candidate. After being hooked on a breakaway, Vernon Fiddler snapped a crafty backhander past the elite Tuukka Rask. This sent Stars fans through the roof, and TD Garden into a hole. After five anxious-filled minutes of overtime, the shootout was imminent and Patrice Bergeron started it off with a five hole sneaker on Kari Lehtonen. With the advantage resting with the Bruins, the crowd made sure to give former B and current Star Tyler Seguin a hearty bellow of boos, to which he responded with a rip past Rask. With Lehtonen stoning the rest of his competitors, Rich Peverley held the fate of both teams on his stick. As boos dwindled around him, he found Rask’s five hole and thus ended the game, sending the sea of black and gold home with no pity. Great game!
Pittsburgh @ Dallas, 3-0 F:
After a depressing January that led the Stars to a 1-8-1 record to start the New Year, they found a way to get back on their heels during a 5 game homestand, going 3-1-1 and producing quality offense and netminding while doing it. The third of these games was when the Pittsburgh Penguins, the Eastern Conference’s best team at that time, came to town, and Dallas handled them rather easily. With a 3-0 win in front of a sold-out crowd, there was a lot to be excited about. Whether you were grinning over Kari Lehtonen’s second shutout of the week, or the mass of Penguins fans in the stands watching their team get wrecked, or the fact that Dallas rang shots off the post three times so it could have been 6-0, or that over the homestand up to that point the Stars outscored their opponent 14-1, or simply that the Stars beat the Penguins, it was a fantastic game to watch and take part in!
So, you vote now! Be on the lookout tomorrow for the next edition of this playoffs series! You have until 2:30 PM CST on Saturday, August 30 to cast your vote and help the game you thought was better to move on! VOTE BELOW.
Comments and questions below, and as always thanks for reading! Go Stars.
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