Dallas Stars Shift From “Team To Beat” To Team To Beat
Saturday night proved two things: the Dallas Stars finally understand how to recover from slumps and they are once again the team to beat in the NHL.
If you are a human being in touch with your superhero-loving side, you have probably seen The Dark Knight trilogy. It’s the latest Batman series that will go down as one of, if not the most popular movie trilogy of all time. Whether you’ve seen all three or not, I’m banking on the fact that you’ve at least seen The Dark Knight Rises, the final movie of the trilogy.
After the popularity of its predecessor, The Dark Knight, skyrocketed, it seemed like everyone and their grandmother went to see the final installment in the summer of 2012.
Whether you enjoyed the plot and cast and whatnot, the storyline had a lesson embedded in it that many people could miss. This lesson also seems to be exclusively applying to the Dallas Stars.
In the film, the main villain Bane is focused on doing what all villains in comic book movies want: becoming the overarching ruler of a new society and creating a new world order. Why would anyone want that? There’s just one problem standings in Bane’s way: the caped crusader.
Well, this wasn’t the case at the beginning of the movie. In fact, Bane tossed Batman aside as if he were a plastic bag floating through the air on a cool, breezy spring day. After mentally and physically breaking Batman to pieces, Bane sends him to a pit in the middle of the desert that only one person had ever escaped from.
This pit is supposed to be Batman’s final resting place, considering his current state in the movie. I mean only one out of thousands of people had ever made it out, so why should Batman be able to? Oh right, because the plot line needs to thicken a little.
After taking a journey of self-examination, Bruce Wayne finds his way out of the pit and gets back to Gotham City in the nick of time. He easily puts down the rebellion set up by Bane and saves the city one last time before exiting into retirement.
Bruce Wayne is the Dallas Stars. The Dallas Stars must be Batman. At least, there are plenty of similarities to prove it.
Since October 8, the Dallas Stars have been piecing together a rapid and adventurous journey as they attempt to return to the Stanley Cup Playoffs. The 2014-2015 season had high expectations in the beginning that were not fulfilled in the end, and as a result the Stars went on an early vacation.
But after October, November, and December of 2015 passed by, it looked like the Stars would not only be visiting the playoffs, but also have a strong shot at the Stanley Cup Finals. They finished 2015 with the best record in the NHL.
The month of January came along, and the Dallas Stars experienced a major withdrawal. Their winning came in spurts and their losing became more consistent. Dallas finished with a 3-6-2 record in the month and fell to third place in the NHL and second in the Western Conference overall. It got to the point where teams were going into a game against the Stars expecting two points, no matter how skilled they were themselves.
The Stars became the team to beat, only not in a good way. They were more specifically the team that just about anyone could best in a game.
The problem was, Stars fans had already seen that form of subpar play last year. It had made multiple appearances in the 2014-2015 season, and Dallas fans had assumed that it died with the prior season.
In other words, they were in the pit. As the Stars slipped in the standings, their fans lost heart. Experiencing a slump mid-season is never what you want to happen for your team, especially when things are so tight in the standings.
Once the All-Star Break rolled around, the Dallas Stars stared down a threatening February schedule. The club knew that if they had another January-like month, they would be out of the playoff picture in no time.
So they stepped it up, and in a big way no less. The Stars pressed through the first half of the month and are currently 5-1-0 in the span. This includes impressive victories over the Chicago Blackhawks and Washington Capitals in the last week. Go figure.
It seems as though the Stars are now the team to beat, this time in the good sense. The Stars faced the two best teams in the league this past week and delivered a thorough beating to both of them. That is saying something.
The Dallas Stars have successfully escaped the pit, and not many teams can do that. Most of the time when an NHL team logs a difficult month, it is followed by more difficult months and considered a “tank” season. What the Stars have been able to do is rather impressive. Now, another slump could hit at any moment and there is nothing they can do to foretell that coming. But for not they are in good shape.
The fact that the Stars successfully escaped the pit and created a new image for themselves all while returning to their former glorified status says something about them. Mainly, it says that they are a legitimate force to be reckoned with in this league. For all the people who spent last month looking at the Stars flaws and calling them a false hope team, look at them now.
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The Stars are back in business. This is not only due to their offense (scoring 3.25 goals per game), but also giving credit to their defense that locks things down, at least through the first 40 minutes of the game. The Stars are seeing a three-sided effort, and that’s what confident and capable teams offer night in and night out.
Being out of the pit is awesome. Once Batman made his way out, he became the unstoppable force he had once been and easily put down Bane’s rebellion, saving the day once again. If breaking this ugly month-long slump is proof of anything, it’s that the Stars are for real this year. They can do just about anything, though their protection of third-period leads could be a little more fluid.
Next: Stars Playing Exceptional Hockey, But Still Finding Bugs
So will the Dallas Stars channel their inner Batman and be unstoppable down the home stretch of their regular season? Or will they once again be forced to make their way out of the hole? It’s all in their hands now.