Andrew's Dallas Stars Blog

Niskanen scratched tonight

Matt Niskanen is the scratch on defense tonight. Fabian Brunnstrom is scratched as well, as expected.

Grossman in tonight

Nicklas Grossman will return tonight after missing the last four games with a back injury. Marc Crawford said he hasn’t decide which defenseman will come out of the lineup.

Crawford said he had nothing new on Mike Modano, who had an appendectomy yesterday. The official word is indefinite, but the best guess still appears to be two weeks.

With Modano out, Brian Sutherby will be back in the lineup from all appearances.

Kari Lethonen in net, but we already knew that. 

Tuesday morning playoff race update

Crawford on Modano

Just talked with Stars coach Marc Crawford about Mike Modano’s status after the appendectomy today. He said Modano’s out indefinitely and they’ll have to see how he comes off the surgery.

“I guess it matters how intrusive they are. No one knows for sure. I would think he’ll play again this year,” Crawford said. “We’ll just have to see how he comes out of it. He’ll be indefinite until we see him come out of it.”

Right now, there’s no plan to call anybody up. They’ve got a couple extra forwards and Crawford said he’ll probably bring Brian Sutherby back into the lineup tomorrow against the Sharks.

Modano has surgery for appendectomy

Here’s the release from the Stars (updated to reflect the correct games played):

Dallas Stars center Mike Modano underwent surgery today for an appendectomy and will be out of action indefinitely. He is not expected to play in the Stars’ home game vs. San Jose on Tuesday evening.

Modano, 39, did not practice with the team today. He has appeared in 54 games for Dallas this season, scoring 13 goals and 13 assists for 26 points with 20 penalty minutes.

The Stars will play the San Jose Sharks Tuesday night at American Airlines Center at 7:30 (CT). The game will be televised locally on FOX Sports Southwest and can be heard on Sports Radio 1310 The Ticket.

Ovechkin suspended two games

Alex Ovechkin has been suspended two games for his hit on Brian Campbell. The Washington Post has details here.

Here’s video of the hit:

DirecTV and Versus reach agreement

Good news for the NHL. The word is that Versus will be back on DirecTV starting today. DirecTV is providing updates on the agreement on its Twitter feed. Among them is this:

“When Versus returns today it will be available in HD and in the same programming packages it was previously found in.”

Here’s the press release:

DIRECTV and Comcast have reached an agreement to return VERSUS to the DIRECTV programming lineup today. The terms of the deal were not disclosed.

VERSUS will return to the same DIRECTV programming packages it was in at the end of August 2009.

“We are pleased that both sides were able to work out a satisfactory deal to bring this programming back to our customers,” said Derek Chang, executive vice president, Content Strategy and Development, DIRECTV.

“We’re excited that we were able to come to a fair agreement that puts VERSUS back in millions of homes with DIRECTV in time for our busy spring programming schedule,” said Jamie Davis, president of VERSUS. “We look forward to super-serving these fans with NHL regular-season and playoff coverage, our first live UFC event and much more.”

Zubov update: Team upset in playoffs

It’s the end of road for Sergei Zubov’s season in the KHL. His SKA St. Petersburg team, the top seed in the West, was upset in the first round of the playoffs by eighth seeded Dinamo Riga, which took the series 3-1.

Zubov’s final regular season stats were 10 goals, 32 assists and a plus-eight rating while playing in 53 of his team’s 56 games. He had one assist and a plus-one rating in four playoff games.

The KHL’s English site is here.

SKA’s English site is here.

But there’s another former Star you can follow in the KHL playoffs. He’s tied for the goal scoring lead in the postseason so far and you can find his KHL page here.

Monday practice update: Lehtonen to start vs. Sharks

The big news out of practice in Frisco today is that Kari Lehtonen will get the start in goal tomorrow against San Jose.

“He’s had a good couple weeks with us now and he’s getting more familiar and, more importantly, conditioning-wise he’s ready to get the start and we’re going to give him the opportunity,” Stars coach Marc Crawford said. “We’re hoping he comes in and plays a strong game.”

This will be Lehtonen’s second start with the Stars. The first one was a 6-3 loss at Pittsburgh on March 6 when he looked rusty and showed some signs of fatigue as the game moved along.

“I think I am more ready now than I was in Pittsburgh,” said Lehtonen. “Now I just need to go out there and help this team. I am confident I can do that.”

As for defenseman Nicklas Grossman, he practiced today and Crawford said it looks like he is ready to return from a back injury, but there won’’t be definitive word on his status for the San Jose game until tomorrow morning. 

Monday morning playoff race update

Page 1 of 176 pages  1 2 3 >  Last »