Game 36: San Jose Sharks @ Dallas Stars

Monday, December 21, 2009 · 7:30 p.m. CT

American Airlines Center - Dallas, Texas

TV: FSSW | Radio: 1310 The Ticket

Canes Country talks to Aaron Ward about his program that provides a luxury suite to Hurricanes home games for active duty military and veterans.

This morning, Defending Big D underwent a bit of a visual overhaul, as we work to streamline the manner in which we present our site and the vast amount of information at our disposal. It had become apparent to me that our front page presentation was cluttered and just wasn't advantageous for navigating our site for all of our readers. Additionally, there was more that I wanted to do secondary pages (more on that below) and we needed to come up with a better way of organization.

Thanks to RyanM, as always, for his design artistry in putting together these graphics for the buttons.

On the left sidebar, you will now find a central location for all of our information here on Defending Big D. Each button will take you to the corresponding page.

Meet the Writers - In depth bios on (most) of our writers here at Defending Big D, as well as contact information.

Organizational Depth Chart - Exactly as it sounds. From the NHL all the way to junior hockey prospects, every player in the organization is here.

Defending Big D LIVE - This is our official page for our weekly podcast and has all of the information you need to listen to our show.

Community Guidelines, FanPost & FanShot tips and the DBD User Guide - Our community rules and a great how-to on how to use all of our great feature here at Defending Big D.

Dallas Stars Tweets - This page has a constantly updated stream of all major Dallas Stars writers and bloggers. (under construction)

Dallas Stars Salary Cap Tracker - When finished, this will be an unofficial salary cap tracker for the Dallas Stars organization. (under construction)

I've also added a much simpler button for our Twitter feed and a link to our Facebook page. Hopefully this new look will help clean up the site a bit more and provide a better method for our readers to access the information available on our site. If you have any suggestions for more features and pages, please let us know.

Once more, I also want to point out our FanPosts and FanShots. Defending Big D is a community, not just a blog, and we want your involvement as well. FanPosts are a great way of having your opinion heard and starting conversations and debates not found in the main threads. For a great example for how FanPosts are utilized, visit Lone Star Ball.

Per Mike Heika of the Dallas Morning News, the Dallas Stars are expected to recall Ivan Vishnevskiy and place Mark Fistric on retroactive injured reserve.

They didn't practice today, so I'm not sure if one of their defensemen is hurt or if they simply want an extra body around or if they will take one of the defensemen out of the lineup and insert Vishnevskiy. I guess it's even a possibility that they play seven defensemen with 11 forwards.

We'll find all of that out in the morning and see what the plan is for San Jose on Monday night.

Is there a chance that the Dallas Stars sit Matt Niskanen as a healthy scratch and play Ivan Vishnevskiy in his place? Niskanen saw his minutes significantly cut in the win against the Red Wings, and Vishnevskiy has the ability to slide directly into the role of point defenseman on the power play.

It's an interesting mood Dallas sports fans are in this morning. As the holidays approach, the feeling among us all has shifted a bit from where we were just 24 hours prior. Apprehension, worry and a lingering sense of foreboding was creeping into our psyche as the feeling that the season was creeping into seriously disappointing territory grew.

Dallas Stars 4, Detroit Red Wings 3.

Dallas Cowboys 24, New Orleans Saints 17

I understand that not every Stars fan is a Cowboys fan, but for this writer the two teams live side by side in my heart. I have lived and breathed the Dallas Cowboys and Dallas Stars for nearly my entire life and I find that at times my health, attitude and well-being are adversely affected by these two sports teams. Lately I've tried my best to distance my emotions from the outcomes of the games and I've been doing a pretty decent job of turning off the television after another loss and just...moving on. Business as usual. Yesterday, however, was the first time all season that I have jumped out my chair, punching the air and screaming like a banshee after a Stars goal. All while chatting on ESPN.

While the parallels between yesterday's two big wins aren't exactly on the same level of magnitude, I cannot express to you how big the victory over the Red Wings was for this team. After the jump, some thoughts not only on yesterday's game but on the near-future of the Dallas Stars, some trade talk, and further musing on the financial status of the team.

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Game 35: Detroit Red Wings @ Dallas Stars

Saturday, December 19, 2009 · 2:00 p.m. CT

American Airlines Center - Dallas, Texas

TV: KDFI My27 | Radio: 1310 The Ticket

As a reminder: I will be joining Richard Durrett of ESPNDallas.com during today's game for a live chat over at his ESPN Dallas Stars blog. Stop by and say hello.

The Copper & Blue talks to mayor Mick Cornett about the possibility of the Edmonton Oilers moving their AHL affiliate to Oklahoma City.

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Critical mass

-noun
1. Physics. the amount of a given fissionable material necessary to sustain a chain reaction at a constant rate.
2. An amount necessary or sufficient to have a significant effect or to achieve a result.

Frustration among Dallas Stars fans is now at it's highest point since 2002, when the team missed the playoffs and Ken Hitchcock moved on. The Stars have developed an uncanny ability to find ways to lose and it's never the same thing on any given night. Some games this team possesses one of the most potent offensive attacks you'll find in the NHL while other times the team struggles to get more than two goals a game. Marty Turco has had some of his best games of his career this season, yet has done little to prove that he belongs in Dallas long term and has rebounded completely from his disappointing performance of 2008-09.

Despite these setbacks and overwhelming anger towards the product on the ice, it becomes increasingly important to remember that patience must be maintained through this dark period in the season. It's easy to say and tough to follow through on, but it's good to remember that this is a young team that is still building experience playing in new system. Unfortunately, those reasons and excuses can only last for so long.

We have now approached a crossroads in the Dallas Stars season. Down one path lies the route to mediocrity and obscurity, to the land of underachieving teams constantly locked in a battle to build a winner; down the other is a path that leads to progress and improvement. No one is expecting the Dallas Stars to suddenly morph into Stanley Cup contenders in month; fans will gladly take a return to fundamentally sound hockey and at the very least a few regulation wins. At this point in the season we've started to truly learn what the Stars are all about as a team and that is one devoid of identity and lacking a solid and established core of leadership.

That's not to say there isn't time to turn things around and in the right direction, because there is still over 40 games to go. Right now, on December 18, fans will just be content with solid effort and execution and somehow finding a way to get a win.

After the jump, injury news for both the Dallas Stars and Detroit Red Wings.

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Once again the NHL has had a slew of boarding calls to deal with this week, and once again the NHL has been consistently inconsistent with their punishments. Both David Koci and Jarko Ruutu were handed game misconducts for their respective hits this week, both reminiscent of the James Neal hit from last month for which he received a two-game suspension from the NHL. While both hits were similar, the NHL ruled they were not as serious and has merely fined them both.

The NHL can't claim the punishment's were less severe because of a lack of injury; both Patrick Kaleta and Mike Green had to be helped off the ice and Green was bleeding from his left eye. Complicating matters further is the fact that both Koci and Ruutu have unsavory reputations; Ruutu is a repeat offender and has been suspended once before, while Koci is known as nothing more than goon (in his NHL debut, Koci amassed 47 PIM while getting into three fights).

Ruutu's hit wasn't as visually devastating as Koci's, and some debate whether it was truly a hit from behind. The shoulder to the head didn't help much. Here's the video:

We've said it before and we went into detail during last night's post-game show; get ready because this season is going to be one hell of a bumpy ride for Stars fans. After forcing overtime in a game they should have won by four goals, the Dallas Stars lost once more in the extra frame. Instead of the normal 'here's a rundown of what happened' game recap, I'm going to give you ten thoughts on tonight's overtime loss to the Atlanta Thrashers; we'll have much more details and breakdowns tomorrow.

First thought: Ondrej Pavelec is incredible.

Ten more thoughts, after the jump.

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