Pete DeBoer earned his firing, but the Stars' problems run deeper

New York Times

14 hours ago

It was the rashness of the decision, yanking goaltender Jake Oettinger after just two shots, neither of which was all that stoppable. It was the humiliating manner in which he made the decision, emphatically and animatedly calling Oettinger back to the bench for a globally televised walk of shame after a timeout. And it was the callousness with which he threw Oettinger under the bus in his very first response following the game, all but saying Oettinger was incapable of beating the Edmonton Oilers, and that there was 'a pretty big sample size' worth of proof.
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Yes, Pete DeBoer got himself fired as Dallas Stars head coach with the way he treated Oettinger in their last game of the season, a 6-3 loss to Edmonton in Game 5 of the Western Conference final. Oh, sure, everyone said the right things two days later on locker clean-out day, but you have to think the exit interviews that day were a tad more blunt and a lot more truthful.
In a battle between a famously peripatetic coach and a 26-year-old franchise goaltender, the goaltender wins every time. Oettinger is very well-liked and deeply respected by his teammates, and it's hard to imagine a coach winning back a locker room after such a public meltdown. Maybe if DeBoer didn't panic and instead let Oettinger work through it in Game 5, maybe if the communication had been stronger between the two, maybe if DeBoer fell on his own sword after the game instead of driving it through the back of Oettinger, he'd still be Dallas' coach.
But he didn't. So he isn't.
That's the business. DeBoer knows it all too well. Over the past 10 seasons, he's posted a sparkling record of 445-247-75, good enough for a .629 points percentage. For comparison's sake, Tampa Bay's Jon Cooper, the gold standard of head coaches for the past decade, is at .643. DeBoer is that good. He's reached the Western Conference final an astounding six times in the last eight seasons with three different teams. He's been to the Stanley Cup Final twice. Yet this is the fifth time he's been fired. He lasted just three lousy seasons with the Florida Panthers in the late 2000s. He took the New Jersey Devils to the Stanley Cup Final in his first season but was fired three years later. He took the San Jose Sharks to the Stanley Cup Final in his first season there, too, but was fired four years later. He took the Vegas Golden Knights to two straight conference finals and was fired the following year. And he took the Stars to the conference final in all three of his seasons, only to be fired yet again.
The timing is cruel because there are no other job openings left in the NHL. But you can be sure DeBoer will get another job, and soon. Despite being fired so often, he's had a head-coaching job every year since the 2008-09 season. At just 56 years old, he'll get another. And then another after he wears out his welcome and gets fired from that one.
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'He'll be all right,' said Panthers coach and close friend Paul Maurice, who knows a thing or two about bouncing around the league. 'He's a good coach. I think you get elite teams, you've got to push them real hard to get to where they get to, and then at some point, you get a summer off. Pick your spot. He's going to be OK.'
So, yes, DeBoer will be fine.
But will the Stars?
Because while DeBoer certainly earned his dismissal with the way things ended, he's hardly the reason Dallas fell a round short of the Stanley Cup Final yet again. Was it DeBoer's fault that Mikko Rantanen had no goals in the Western Conference final after all but singlehandedly beating the Colorado Avalanche in the first round? Was it DeBoer's fault that Wyatt Johnston was somehow a minus-16 through three rounds? Or that Matt Duchene was snakebitten throughout the playoffs, scoring just once in 18 games after a 30-goal season? Or that captain Jamie Benn disappeared for most of the postseason? What about Tyler Seguin? Or Mason Marchment? Or Evgenii Dadonov? Were their failures all DeBoer's fault, too?
How about last spring, when Roope Hintz had fewer goals than Esa Lindell? And Hintz and Duchene and Thomas Harley and Joe Pavelski and Dadonov combined for zero goals against the Oilers? Was that all DeBoer's fault? Or Oettinger's, for that matter?
The Stars are perennial Cup favorites because of their remarkable depth, with Duchene often saying they have 'three first lines.' But in these playoffs, Rantanen had to carry them early, and when he cooled off, nobody stepped up to shoulder the burden. Of course, DeBoer could have better tweaked the lines or switched up the matchups or benched a skater to try to spark things. But ultimately, hockey games are won or lost by players, not by coaches.
And the players have failed in the conference final. For three straight years.
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It's not for a lack of trying. General manager Jim Nill has built a powerhouse, and he's added to it at every trade deadline. Two years ago, he went out and got Max Domi and Dadonov for grit and goals. Last year, he added Chris Tanev, everyone's idea of a playoff defenseman. This year, he acquired Mikael Granlund, Cody Ceci and Rantanen, the latter of whom is one of the best players — and playoff performers — of his or any other generation.
Still, it wasn't enough.
'You get things in place, but things always happen,' Nill told me early in the conference final, when I said he and his team were 'sitting pretty' for the present and the future. 'We've still got some work to do.'
Yeah, things happened.
Wholesale changes aren't coming. The Stars will continue to be trendy picks to win the Stanley Cup for years to come, and they'll do so with largely the same core they have now. Rantanen is signed for eight more years, as is Oettinger. Hintz is signed for six more years, Johnston and Lindell for five, Miro Heiskanen for four. Nill was adamant that Benn and Duchene, both unrestricted free agents, would be back next season, but you have to wonder if the way things ended will prompt Nill to shake things up — if just for the sake of shaking things up.
Which brings us back to the coach. Who takes over now? The timing of the firing leaves Dallas with few big-name options, as the annual game of coaching musical chairs has left the Stars without a seat. Does Nill look within and promote Texas Stars coach Neil Graham, who has worked with Oettinger, Harley and Jason Robertson in the AHL? Does he try to pluck an assistant from another team's staff, perhaps even Oilers power-play mastermind and former Stars head coach Glen Gulutzan? Or does he target another rising AHL coach, such as former Stars assistant Todd Nelson? Do Peter Laviolette or John Tortorella, as abrasive and nomadic as DeBoer, hold any appeal?
And most importantly, will any of them fare any better than DeBoer, one of the most successful coaches of the modern era? Or is this simply a conference-final level team, a group that performs better on paper than it does in the biggest moments?
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This is now the big question facing Nill, bigger than Benn or Duchene: Who are these Dallas Stars, and what is their ceiling?
'We've been knocking on the door for a while, and you only get so many opportunities,' Nill told me. 'I've been talking to a few of the young guys here, who came in the last three or four years, and they think this is ordinary stuff, winning like this three years in a row. I tell them not to take this for granted. This is not easy. We've got an opportunity, so let's take advantage of it.'
Dallas didn't. Again. Which leads to this kind of existential crisis, this kind of drastic decision.
The Stars are a very, very good team. DeBoer is a very, very good coach. Together, they had very, very good results.
But Dallas is looking for great. And so DeBoer is looking for work. We'll just have to wait and see who's looking for longer.