The Dallas Stars are off to a strong start to the 2022-2023 season. They’re tied with the Jets atop the Central Division standings as October draws to a close. I last checked in on the Stars in early September, ahead of training camp. At the time, the Stars looked stuck in mediocrity and were likely set to do battle for a wild card spot this season. With a few regular season games in the books, it’s time for an update.
2022-2023 Season Performance
Team Performance
The Stars 5-3-1 record is a great result for the first month of the season. Short term results can be misleading at times, however, as hot and cold streaks play a factor over stretches of games. Nine games is a ‘less small’ sample that is enough to get excited about, it’s not enough to have full confidence in long term sustainability.
Looking a little deeper at what has made the Stars successful through the first month of the season can give us some indication how sustainable their results might be. First off, they have a positive expected goal differential at 5v5 which is a strong indicator of longer term success. Their expected goal rates are higher than the projections (both for and against), so the Stars are playing higher event hockey than the model expected. With the head coaching change this offseason, that’s not entirely a surprise and we should expect the model to adjust as the season goes on.
The Stars have also benefited from strong goaltending to start the season. Jake Oettinger picked up where he left off in last year’s playoffs and has helped put his team in a position to win regularly. The Stars goaltending isn’t likely to stay as hot as it’s been all year, but even with some regression toward average, it looks like it will be a factor this season.
Top Performers
38 year old Joe Pavelski continues to defy aging curves and has been highly productive to start the 2022-2023 season. The veteran is centering young wingers Jason Robertson and Roope Hintz once again and they’ve been the Stars most dominant line. Pavelski has found the scoresheet with regularity so far this season and his defensive impact has been among the best in the NHL.
Acquired from the New York Rangers near the beginning of the regular season, Nils Lundkvist has grabbed hold of the opportunity to be an NHL regular. His defensive impact has been a bit below average, but his offensive impact has been strong enough to be net positive overall. He seems to have settled into the Stars D-corps quickly and is making a strong case to stay in the lineup every night.
As noted in the team performance summary, Jake Oettinger didn’t miss a beat over the summer. He followed up an incredible playoff series against the Flames by putting up excellent numbers through the month of October. He’s been one of the NHL’s best goaltenders so far this season, saving over a goal above expected per 60 minutes at 5v5 and we’re already seeing his projected impact trend upward.
Tough luck for Oettinger and the Stars this week, as Oettinger left Saturday’s game with an injury an will be re-evaluated next week.
2022 Offseason Moves – Hindsight Edition
The Stars landed one of the most hyped unrestricted free agents of the 2022 offseason, signing Mason Marchment to a 4 year, $18M deal. In our preseason synopsis, we noted that Marchment looked like a capable middle six forward who would likely perform well on the second line. He’s started the season alongside Tyler Seguin with Denis Gurianov/Ty Dellandrea on the opposite wing and while he’s found the scoresheet a few times, both his defensive and offensive impact could stand to improve. It’s still early though, as he’s seen just 116 minutes at 5v5 so far, and a larger sample size may be all it takes.
The Stars other major offseason business was re-signing RFAs Jason Robertson and Jake Oettinger. We’ve already looked at Oettinger in our top performer section and Jason Robertson could have easily slotted in that section as well. Alongside Joe Pavelski and Roope Hintz, Robertson is putting up excellent numbers early this season.
2022-2023 Roster Profile Updates
Still early in the season, most of the change in the Stars roster profile since our last update comes due to roster decisions made since the end of training camp. The player projections will start to adjust with 22/23 season data and affect the roster profile once players cross 200 minutes at 5v5. So far, Oettinger is the only Star over that mark and his impact trending upward gave the Stars goaltending rating a bump.
Central Division Landscape
The Central Division landscape looks different than it did a month ago. The Predators and Wild both stumbled their way through October, allowing the Avalanche to regain favorite status in the division. The Stars hot start has helped them break into the top 3 and they now look well positioned to land a divisional playoff berth. There’s still a hungry pack of teams close behind, however, so they’ll have to keep an eye on the rear-view mirror.
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Free Preview! The Dallas Stars team page has been unlocked as a free preview this week. Check it out here.
Historical player data from Natural Stat Trick. Contract data from CapFriendly.
