A club plagued by spotty team defense in recent years, even as it posted the top regular season in the Western Conference in 2015-16 before crashing hard this year, the Dallas Stars have turned back to a familiar face to correct the issue after the dismissal of Lindy Ruff as head coach.
On Wednesday, Stars general manager Jim Nill announced the hiring of Ken Hitchcock as the team's new head coach. Hitchcock, of course, steered the Stars to the Stanley Cup championship in 1998-99 and back to the Final again the next year. The hallmark of Hitchcock-coached teams has always been its defensive discipline. Unless a player pays consistent attention to detail without the puck as well as on the attack, he is going to have problems with the head coach.
Hitchcock is known for being relentless on his players; as such, he is a coach with a defined shelf life. In his second go-round with the Stars, he is not being brought in to build toward something a few years down the line (as he was when he was hired the first time). He is there to immediately correct an ongoing problem.
The Stars' goaltending in recent years has been much criticized, and the netminders' statistics look ugly. While goalies Kari Lehtonen and Antti Niemi have been inconsistent in their own right, the issues have more often started with breakdowns in the play in front of them. Actually, the goaltending showed improvement this season at even strength. The club has retained goaltending coach Jeff Reese. There still could be some personnel change in the net, but that plan remains to unfold.
Dallas Stars Blogger • 
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