Dallas Stars return to action after COVID 19 hiatus

Well as the Dallas Stars said on Twitter, lets call today “Good News Monday.” Today the Dallas Stars announced that 10 players are coming off the COVID 19 list and Thursday will be their first game back against the Panthers.

I know this has been agonizing stretch of no Stars hockey for some die hard fans, but the light is at the end of the tunnel. Now don’t expect the Stars to come out of gate firing on all cylinders on Thursday night, some of the players can still be rusty after having COVID 19. I’ve read some articles on players skating for the first time after COVID 19 and they said it takes some time to get back to full speed.

Hopefully, Bowness runs the players through a couple of full game scrimmages between now and Thursday so they are ready to take on the Panthers. Hopefully Jamie Benn will be able to lead the team during the game. If he can’t play in Thursday’s game, I expect Tyler Seguin or Joe Pavelski to take the reigns as captain and lead this team to victory.

The NHL has announced that teams can have a taxi squad of up to six players incase they get hit with COVID. The Stars currently have called up Ty Dellandrea, Riley Damiani, Rhett Gardner, Thomas Harley, Riley Tufte and Adam Scheel to the practice squad. I was actually suprised that Scheel got the call up over Dobby. I guess they want him playing actual games down in Cedar Park than sitting on the bench up here in Dallas.

I hope we don’t have many more game delays due to COVID 19 this season. I would hate to see the Stars have to play almost everyday when they make up missed games in February during what would have been the Olympic break. If everyone can stay heathy for the remainder of the season, Stars fans can enjoy the remainder 2021-22 hockey season.