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Originally Posted by Flacolaco
This team kind of sucks ass heading into the season.
They were playing with the full NHL lineup tonight and they just straight up sucked
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Uh, they didn't have Riberio, Morrow, Zubov, Boucher, or Lehtinen. How is that a full-lineup?
I was actually at the game (8 rows back from the glass
) and the Stars owned it. These weren't ticky-tack pre-season penalties. The Stars earned their man-advantages and held it in the opposition zone for some quite time. Brunnstrom looked great skating- and passing-wise, with a nice redirection for a goal. Neal looked good; had some big checks and a nice putback from Avery's semi-wrap-around (at first they had Petersen with the point, but I think they corrected it). Robidas banged into anything that moved. Richards and Avery looked fantastic, really looking like grizzled veterans compared to all the rookies crowding the ice.
Now the bad: they did not execute. I think their powerplay strategy was all wrong in relation to how Chicago was playing them. The Hawks wanted the Stars to take blue-line shots and the Stars fell for it. Plus, they were sometimes pass-happy: for example, Modano to Robidas to Modano to Robidas to Richards to Modano to Robidas, takes the shot and misses the net. However, I think they will get better when they have their FULL-lineup, which was not here tonight.