The Dallas Stars are officially looking for a new head coach and Pete DeBoer is looking for a new job.
His firing comes after the Stars lost four games in a row to the Edmonton Oilers in the Western Conference Finals, ending their 2025 playoff run.
So what comes next? Here's what you need to know about the firing and the team's future.
Why was DeBoer fired?
The thing that came up time and time again during Friday's press conference with Stars General Manager Jim Nill was that the Stars are really trying to take it to the next level after making the conference finals round — and losing — three years in a row.
Nill said Friday's move was a tough decision, but a necessary one.
"We got together as an organization, I got together with Pete, talked to everybody, and I just think it's just time right now to make that next step," he told reporters.
While it's been one of the most successful three-year runs in Stars history, the team hasn't been able to win that elusive Stanley Cup since their first back in 1999. The team did make the Cup final back in 2020 before DeBoer came on, but before that hadn't been to the finals since 2000. That didn't change under DeBoer despite making some really big moves at the trade deadline this year, bringing in guys like Mikko Rantanen, Mikael Granlund and Cody Ceci. Expectations rose, and while Nill talked about the fact that DeBoer was trying to push all the different buttons he could during the playoffs, this feels like the next button Nill could push to take that coveted next step forward.
Does this have anything to do with Jake Oettinger?
One of the more controversial aspects of the deciding Game 5 against Edmonton was DeBoer's decision to pull star goalie Jake Oettinger after giving up two goals on the first two shots of the game.
Nill did stand behind DeBoer's decision to pull Oettinger. However, he didn't stand behind DeBoer's postgame comments that threw Oettinger under the bus, pointing out the team had lost seven of eight games to the Oilers with Oettinger in net. Nill said those comments were part of the decision to move on from DeBoer, though he followed that up by saying it wasn't the full picture.
"That's one part of it, but there's other things take place during the season," he said. "As I mentioned, my job is to analyze everything during the year, where are things at, even the prior years. But it was a component of it, but it wasn't the final decision."
Another point of discussion in the press conference was about the Stars style of play, and the fact that they weren't able to score a ton of goals in the playoffs at times. They really struggled with that and have for several years as they've gone deeper into the playoffs. That's going to be one of the things on Nill’s mind as the team looks for new candidates who might bring a different style offensively compared to DeBoer.
What about DeBoer's track record?
A lot of coaches would love to have the resume that Pete DeBoer does, which is something Nill readily acknowledged. In addition to the three straight conference finals in Dallas, he made two back when he was with the Vegas Golden Knights in 2020 and 2021, and also made one with the San Jose Sharks in 2019. That's six of the last seven years he's been able to lead a team to the brink of competing for a Stanley Cup. He even made the Stanley Cup final with San Jose in 2016 and in 2012 with the New Jersey Devils.
But he hasn't been able to win that elusive cup, and now he's been fired by three teams in a row — before this, both the Sharks and Golden Knights parted ways with him after just four and three seasons, respectively.
Hockey's a tough business. Fans and organizations expect success at the highest level and he just hasn't quite been able to deliver that.
What's DeBoer saying about all this?
Nothing, at least publicly. Nill did say that DeBoer expressed some remorse for those postgame comments about Oettinger after the season. And DeBoer did walk back those comments a bit in his exit interview with the media following the season. Those were his last public comments, and he mentioned the team's struggles against the Oilers over the last two years — falling to them twice in the conference finals — wasn't just on Oettinger, but the entire group.
"We scratched veteran guys in order to try and change that, we moved guys up and down the lineup, we switched lines, we switched power play units," he said. "I mean, you know, you're looking for solutions in order to try to flip that momentum."
He highlighted the fact that Oettinger, to him and to a lot of folks, is the best young goaltender in the league. But he also defended the decision to pull Oettinger, and said the young goalie still has some things to learn and grow from.
What now?
A search is underway, and Nill said he's keeping an open mind to a variety of candidates rather than just relying on the traditional hockey thinking to bring in a veteran coach for a group like this to try to get them to break through.
One interesting aspect of DeBoer's firing is the decision — at least for now — to retain the entirety of his coaching staff. Nill said he feels good about keeping that coaching staff around to retain some veteran experience with the team, and it could give them some confidence to go with a younger coach or someone with less NHL experience.
One person that's emerged as an intriguing early candidate is Neil Graham. He's the head coach of Dallas' AHL affiliate, the Texas Stars, in Cedar Park. He's in his sixth season leading the team, and Nill seems to have been impressed with his success despite plenty of roster turnover with newcomers that have since gone on to play for the Dallas Stars.
Obviously, any of those veteran assistants the team is keeping could be a new candidate for the job. Or, obviously, someone from outside the organization to provide that new voice and potential new offensive style Nill has talked about.
Beyond that, there are some other big personnel decisions to be made, between pending free agents and salary cap concerns. Longtime captain Jamie Benn is a free agent, and Nill said he wants Benn back and that Benn wants to be back as well. There's also Matt Duchene, their leading points scorer in the regular season, and it's unclear if they'll quite have the money to keep him around.
The big talk recently has been speculation about whether Jason Robertson might be traded. He's been a beloved figure in Dallas for a long time and had some great seasons, but he's got just one year left on his contract before hitting restricted free agency. He's got a nearly $8 million salary cap hit for the 2025-26 season. With Mikko Rantanen's big contract extension kicking in — and the way Rantanen showed up in the playoffs as the Stars' clear top guy — it could be tough to justify paying both him and Robertson the big bucks.
Nill did say that he's wary of potentially shaking things up too much, citing the great locker room chemistry the Stars have had. But obviously he made a tough decision firing DeBoer — and he's got plenty more decisions to make this offseason.
