November 7, 2026
November 7, 2026
Stars’ 2025-26 Season: 112 Points and a Sudden Fall
The Stars’ 2025-26 season was supposed to be the one that finally broke through the Western Conference ceiling. Dallas had reached three straight conference finals and lost all three. A new coach, a 45-goal duo, and 112 points raised hopes again. Then the Minnesota Wild ended it all in six games in the first round.
The search for a different result started with the coach. Dallas fired Pete DeBoer on June 6, 2025, days after a five-game loss to Edmonton in the Western Conference Final. On July 1, general manager Jim Nill turned to a familiar face. Field Level Media reported the return of Glen Gulutzan, who had coached Dallas from 2011 to 2013. He arrived from Edmonton, where he had served as an assistant on two straight Stanley Cup Final teams.
Nill kept the core intact and trimmed the edges. Matt Duchene signed a four-year extension, and captain Jamie Benn returned on a one-year deal. Radek Faksa came home on a three-year contract. Mikael Granlund, Evgenii Dadonov, and Cody Ceci all moved on. The biggest commitment came on October 28, when defenseman Thomas Harley signed an eight-year extension.
Dallas announced itself on opening night. The Stars clawed out a 5-4 win in Winnipeg on October 9 and finished the month 6-3-2. On October 30, Tyler Seguin played his 1,000th NHL game.
November turned a good start into a statement. The Stars went 11-2-2 and stormed through the month with a ruthless edge. They crushed Montreal 7-0 on November 13. Twelve nights later, they hammered Edmonton 8-3 on the road, a pointed result against the team that had ended their previous spring. An 8-3 rout in Anaheim followed on December 19.
January brought the first real wobble. Dallas went 7-6-2, the worst month of the season. The club steadied itself with a perfect 4-0-0 February before the Olympic break. That tournament proved costly, as Mikko Rantanen came back with an injury that cost him time.
The heavier blow landed on March 6 against Colorado. Roope Hintz suffered a lower-body injury in a 5-4 shootout loss and never returned. Two days earlier, Nill had added veteran defenseman Tyler Myers from Vancouver for a second-round and a fourth-round pick.
Dallas held on through March and clinched a fifth straight playoff berth on March 22. A 6-1-0 April closed the regular season, capped by a 4-3 shootout win in Buffalo. The Stars finished 50-20-12 with 112 points, second in the Central Division and third in the NHL. Only Colorado’s record-setting 121 points kept them from a division crown. The complete statistical record is preserved at Hockey-Reference’s 2025-26 Stars page.
Balance defined Gulutzan’s first year. Dallas went 26-11-4 at home and 24-9-8 on the road, rarely letting a bad trip derail the standings. The Stars scored 279 goals and allowed 226, a plus-53 margin. Their 3.33 goals per game ranked ninth in the league. The power play did much of the damage, and that reliance would matter in April.
Two forwards rewrote the franchise record book together. Jason Robertson and Wyatt Johnston each scored 45 goals. No pair of Stars teammates had ever both reached 40 in the same season. The Hockey News noted that they became just the fourth 45-goal duo in the NHL over the last 30 years.
Robertson led the team with 96 points while shifting between Hintz and Duchene. He played the season on an expiring deal, and every goal raised the stakes of his next contract. Johnston, only 22, posted career highs across the board with 86 points in all 82 games. His 27 power-play goals led the league and set a franchise record.
Rantanen’s first full season in Dallas delivered elite production when he was healthy. He scored 22 goals and led the team with 55 assists, finishing with 77 points in 64 games. Hintz added 44 points in 53 games before his injury. Benn, at 36, still scored 15 goals in 60 games.
Esa Lindell anchored the blue line and led the club at plus-30. Seguin, by contrast, missed 55 games and managed only 17 points. In goal, Jake Oettinger went 35-12-6 with four shutouts. His .899 save percentage was the lowest of his career, however. Casey DeSmith provided steady relief with a 15-8-6 record and a .907 save percentage.
The series opened with a warning. Minnesota stunned Dallas 6-1 at home on April 18. The Stars answered with a 4-2 win in Game 2 to even the series.
Game 3 in St. Paul became the night Dallas seemed to seize control. The Wild led late, and the series threatened to tilt. Duchene buried a power-play goal midway through the third period to tie the game 3-3. Regulation ended, then one overtime, then most of another. Finally, Johnston deflected a shot past the Minnesota goaltender for a 4-3 double-overtime win. Dallas led the series 2-1.
Game 4 showed how thin the margins had become. Robertson and Miro Heiskanen both scored on the power play for a 2-1 lead. Marcus Foligno tipped in the tying goal at 14:40 of the third period. Oettinger made 40 saves, but Jesper Wallstedt stopped 43 at the other end. With 29 seconds left in overtime, Matt Boldy deflected a Jared Spurgeon shot to even the series.
The momentum never swung back. Minnesota won Game 5 in Dallas 4-2. Two nights later, the Stars carried a 2-1 lead into the third period of Game 6 on goals from Johnston and Mavrik Bourque. Vladimir Tarasenko tied it. Quinn Hughes then scored his second goal of the night with 9:22 remaining, and Boldy added two empty-netters in a 5-2 loss. FOX 4 covered the final night of a season that ended far too soon.
The numbers explained the collapse. Dallas went 209 minutes and 56 seconds without an even-strength goal. Only four of its 15 goals in the series came at five-on-five or four-on-four. Robertson scored five times and Johnston four, but the depth never answered. Rantanen managed one goal, and Benn finished without a point. The NHL’s elimination breakdown also pointed to fatigue, as Dallas had played 62 playoff games over the previous three springs.
The Stars’ 2025-26 season will be remembered for what Robertson and Johnston built and for how quickly it disappeared. A 50-win campaign, a franchise-first scoring duo, and a record power-play season belong to this group. So does the first opening-round exit since 2022.
How much longer can a contender keep knocking without the door opening? That question now defines the franchise. Hintz’s absence exposed how much the attack leaned on a handful of stars. The aging core of Benn and Seguin faces hard decisions, and Robertson’s restricted free agency hung over the summer. Nill received a contract extension that spring, a sign that ownership still trusts the man who built this roster. Gulutzan, meanwhile, delivered 50 wins in his return to Dallas. His task now is to make that regular-season strength travel into May.
For a fanbase that has waited since 1999 for a second Stanley Cup, the Stars’ 2025-26 season stung in a new way. The regular season proved Dallas remains among the West’s elite. The spring proved that elite is not enough.
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