The Dallas Stars have hit the dreaded “rough patch.”
But thankfully, the team’s hot start has provided enough buoyancy to keep Dallas afloat during a stretch in which the Stars have banked just seven points out of a possible 20 over their last 10 games.
It’s a good time to have one of the team’s seasoned veterans weigh in.
Stars forward Matt Duchene and his 17 years of NHL experience made a recent appearance on The Sweet Spot on Sportsradio 96.7 FM/1310 The Ticket (KTCK-AM) where he was asked about what’s ailing the Stars, who take the ice again on Sunday looking to snap a two-game losing streak.
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The good news: The Stars are back within the nurturing confines of American Airlines Center, their bumpy stretch having coincided with the longest road trip of their 2025-26 schedule.
The veteran Duchene sounded as levelheaded as they come when discussing the Stars regrouping now that they’re back at home, and he sounded confident that this slippery patch his group has hit is just “a blip on the radar.”
See what Duchene had to say below.
Question: “You guys just wrapped up the longest roadtrip of your season, you’ve got a really good Tampa Bay Lightning team coming into town on Sunday. I’ve heard before that it’s not necessarily the road trip that’s the hardest but it’s that first game back home. Is there anything to that?
Duchene: “Yeah I do, but I also think that we have two days here, and then an afternoon game. I think that schedule sets up well. Afternoon games we usually have a bit more jump; I’m not sure why, that’s just kind of how it feels.
“But [if] we played tomorrow I would be a little more buying into that, because you get a day off and then you’re right back at it, there’s jetlag, travel lag, all that kind of stuff. But with the two days here, we should be able to regroup and get a good practice day tomorrow.
“And you know what? Yeah, we didn’t get the result last game, but there was some good stuff to build on. It doesn’t matter how good a team you are or how bad a team you are, you’re gonna have highs and lows in a season. I think this team has always stayed really even-keel, when we’re at the top of our game we’ve never gotten ahead of ourselves. We’ve never, you know, thought like, ‘They’re gonna hand us the Cup tomorrow,’ kind of thing.
“We can’t get the other way, when it’s going this way. This is just a blip on the radar and a time to grow and get better. I think we were probably getting results we didn’t deserve for a while, and now it’s kind of flipped the other way.
“It’s just about how we react to it, how we address it and go forward. Things could click hopefully on Sunday, then we’re off to the races again.”on
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