What Chris Tanev has meant for the Dallas Stars

Chris Tanev’s veteran presence was something that Dallas Stars general manager Jim Nill wanted to bring to the locker room at the trade deadline.

Today on Daily Faceoff Live, Brian Rea joins the show to discuss the addition of Tanev and what he has meant to the Stars team.

Frank Seravalli: Chris Tanev, give us a word on what he has meant to the team and is this maybe the best trade deadline pickup that any team made in 2024?

Brian Rea: Let’s wait and see how the playoffs unfold but put it this way, he is in the running, and he’s absolutely a top-3 choice for the best trade deadline addition. Talk to the Dallas players, he has fit in there like a glove. I think a lot of people identified him as the regular season was progressing as the perfect play the Stars needed. The Stars had no problem scoring goals or having depth defense, it was can they supplement the defensive unit that lost to the Vegas Golden Knights last year. Before that Tanev deal, they ran it back, it was the exact same pairings. Jim Nill even talked about wanting to give Thomas Harley and Nils Lundkvist opportunities for internal growth, they are young players and building-block players.

Brian Rea: I think as we saw the season go on, Harley was making his growth, but Lundkvist it was becoming more and more clear that Dallas had a team that could get over the hump but they needed to add a piece because they knew they were going to go up against Vegas, Colorado, Edmonton, Winnipeg, all these different teams. So when you look at those teams, Mark Stone in Vegas, Rantanen and Nichuskin in Colorado, Evander Kane in Edmonton; these are all big meaty net-front players that can play a very physical game against your d-core and Chris Tanev is built to play that game. Esa Lindell can do it, and Jani Hakanpaa can do it, but to ask two players over the course of Stanley Cup run is a lot. So I think Tanev was a requirement for Dallas and we are seeing the dividends paying off now with what he has done.