{"id":83609,"date":"2025-08-20T23:49:06","date_gmt":"2025-08-20T23:49:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/83609\/"},"modified":"2025-08-20T23:49:06","modified_gmt":"2025-08-20T23:49:06","slug":"gulutzan-focused-on-making-stars-more-physical","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/83609\/","title":{"rendered":"Gulutzan Focused On Making Stars More Physical"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Dallas Stars are in the midst of a frustrating streak. They\u2019ve lost in the Western Conference Finals in each of the last three seasons, including back-to-back losses at the hands of the Edmonton Oilers. In an effort to curb their bad luck, Dallas went directly to the source to fill their head coaching vacancy earlier this summer. They hired Oilers assistant Glen Gulutzan, who brings the sharp assessment of Dallas\u2019 roster that only a Conference rival could have. In an interview with Sean Shapiro of the Dallas Magazine<\/a>, Gulutzan shared that his key focus for the 2025-26 Stars will be playing more physical.<\/p>\n

Gulutzan\u2019s critique of Dallas\u2019 style certainly lands at a good time. The Stars delivered the fewest hits in the league, at even-strength, last season (1,160 total hits). They were also on the receiving end of more hits than any other club (1,963 total hits received). It was the second-straight season that Dallas ranked dead-last in the NHL in terms of hits-given versus hits-received \u2013 but Gulutzan\u2019s urge to address that weakness won\u2019t take too much improvement. The Oilers have also been among the league\u2019s most out-hit clubs, ranking second-to-last in the 2024-25 season and fifth-to-last in 2023-24.<\/p>\n

Even with that standing, Gulutzan acknowledged how much a dash of physicality transformed the Oilers. He pointed directly to the growth of Connor McDavid<\/a> and Leon Draisaitl<\/a>\u00a0over the last two seasons. McDavid recorded a career-high 118 hits in the 2023-24 season, while Draisaitl reached 58 hits, the second-highest mark of his career. Both players took a major step back in hits this season \u2013 McDavid recording just 40, and Draisaitl recording 23 \u2013 but star talent leaning into the physical game clearly inspired the Oilers lineup. Gulutzan told Shapiro:<\/p>\n

You had to ask the elite players to use their skills and smarts to check, not to deliver big body checks, but to check and add a little physicality each shift\u2026 And the reality is that\u2019s the evolution of that group. It happened because [McDavid and Draisitl] wanted it to happen, and reinforced it for everyone. I look at our team [in Dallas]. I\u2019m putting the energy in the same spot<\/p>\n

To their credit, Dallas does have their fair share of bruisers at the top of the lineup. Rookie Lian Bichsel<\/a> managed an incredible 155 hits in just 38 games last season, confidently leading all NHL defensemen in hits-per-60 minutes played. The Stars also continue to receive heavy physicality from captain Jamie Benn<\/a>, who has recorded at least 100 hits in three of the last four seasons \u2013 and 97 hits in his sole off-year. But Gulutzan will ask for more out of the rest of the team\u2019s stars \u2013 a group likely to include Jason Robertson<\/a>, Roope Hintz<\/a>, Mikko Rantanen<\/a> and Wyatt Johnston<\/a> who managed 60, 53, 48, and 45 hits last season respectively.<\/p>\n

A new brand of physicality could be the piece that pushes Dallas past their Western Conference foes. The Florida Panthers just won back-to-back Stanley Cups on the heels of high-pressure forechecking opening ground for their star scorers. That will be the mantra Dallas looks to adopt under new head coach Gulutzan, as they look to pave their way past the Western Conference for the first time since 2020 next season.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Dallas Stars are in the midst of a frustrating streak. They\u2019ve lost in the Western Conference Finals…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":83610,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[556],"tags":[64,63,7521,62975,575,85],"class_list":["post-83609","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nhl","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-dallas-stars","tag-glen-gulutzan","tag-nhl","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/83609","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=83609"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/83609\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/83610"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=83609"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=83609"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=83609"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}