2024 Draft Recap: Dallas Stars
A reduced draft haul didn't stop Dallas from addressing needs while going 3-for-3 with potential NHL'ers at each skater position.
NASHVILLE (The Draft Analyst) — Those familiar with my work know how I feel about draft report cards, even if I’ve been guilty of feeding that beast throughout the last 10 years. But my thoughts on the latest 2024 results will be more than broad brush strokes, as pinning the rose on 12 uninterrupted months of in-depth analysis from both the team and prospect standpoints requires more than the standard letter-grade marking scheme acting as the rubric. Rather, draft hauls will be evaluated and labeled on the following criteria, which I think are both fair and reasonable:
Strong — Any four of potential franchise player(s) drafted; needs addressed; first-round caliber picks in the second or third round; multiple home-run swings in later rounds; point-producing sleepers; the majority of prospects were in top-line/top-pairing/starter roles (Ex. Buffalo’s 2022 draft)
Above-average - Any three of needs addressed; multiple home-run swings; acknowledged consensus favorites; the majority of prospects were in top-line/top-pairing/starter roles; making more with less; first-round quality in the second or third round. (Ex. Carolina’s 2023 draft)
Average — A solid first- or second-round pick but mostly unspectacular thereafter (Ex. Colorado’s 2020 draft)
Below-average — Quantity over quality; over-drafting of higher-round picks/reaching; four picks or less with no first-round selection; obsession with overagers (Ex. New York Rangers’ 2018 draft or Ottawa’s drafts from 2021-2023)
Poor — Any three of unpopular reach in the first round, no picks in the first or second round; needs not addressed, obsession with overagers, leaving upside on the board for projects, or bucking popular consensus choices (Ex. Arizona’s 2020 draft)
Outlook
It must feel profoundly rewarding for an organization’s entire scouting arm to not only fly comfortably above reproach but also have their thought processes toward the draft and player development regarded as a standard for all to emulate. The Stars own the third-best record in the Western Conference since the 2019 season mostly because of their successes at the draft and the deliberate growth period that followed, but recent seasons of legitimate Stanley Cup contention combined with the fast-tracking of several of their top prospects had whittled their 2024 draft class to only three picks while concurrently weakening the strength of their usually-deep farm system. As such, Stars’ scouting director Joe McDonnell and his dependable staff would have to roll up their sleeves for this one.
The trade-off is obvious while the strategic impact up to this point is imperceptible, but owning a first-round pick in 2024 — a year-plus after Dallas general manager Jim Nill uncharacteristically moved his 2023 first-rounder to acquire righty puck-rusher Nils Lundkvist from the New York Rangers — would make success at this year’s draft slightly more critical than in previous years.
One presumed certainty was that the Stars would draft out of the Ontario Hockey League, where 39 percent of their picks since 2019 originated from and provided the organization with at least one draft prospect in 13 consecutive years. And although their pipeline has nearly a handful of blue-chip prospects remaining, the Stars entered the weekend with a shortage of right wingers and left defensemen.
MORE: 2024 NHL Draft Report (PDF Download)
Traded picks
The Stars had as many reasons to trade back and add draft capital as they had to show restraint and take swings with a reduced three-pick allotment. But Nill and McDonnell were likely less impressed with the 2024 class than next year’s group; a sentiment often repeated by several organizations throughout the weekend. Thus, there was no movement of picks, as Dallas stood its ground in the first (29th overall), fifth (158th), and seventh (222nd) rounds, while currently owning six of seven picks in 2025, with the lone subtraction being the 2025 second-rounder they included in the 2023 deadline deal with Chicago for rental Max Domi.
Therefore, for historical purposes, the four picks the Stars relinquished before the 2024 draft went as follows:
Round 2 (62nd overall) — Calgary selected scoring winger Jacob Battaglia with the second-round pick they acquired (along with former Dallas defense prospect Artyom Grushnikov) in last deadline’s three-team trade that landed defenseman Chris Tanev with the Stars (Tanev signed with Toronto on July 1).
Round 3 (94th overall) — Nashville selected multi-tool Kelowna Rockets winger Hiroki Gojskic with the swapped third-rounder it acquired from Dallas at last year’s draft when the Stars moved up to grab OHL center Brad Gardiner at 79th overall. Also involved in that deal was Dallas’ 2024 sixth, which the Predators moved to Arizona (now Utah) at the 2024 trade deadline for rental winger Jason Zucker. Utah would use the pick on Norwegian defenseman Ludvig Lafton at 190th overall.
Round 4 (126th overall) — Detroit selected Barrie Colts goalie Landon Miller with the fourth-rounder it acquired from Dallas in the 2022 deadline deal for center Vlad Namestnikov, who had five points in 15 regular-season games for the Stars and a goal and an assist in seven playoff games before signing with Tampa Bay in the offseason.
Round 6 (190th overall) — See Round 3.
MORE: 2023-24 NHL Farm System Rankings and Assessments (Pre-Draft)
Draft picks
Assessment: Average
One would think the Stars would get a bad grade for owning only three picks, but they emerged from The Sphere with three respected prospects within the European scouting community who happened to rank within my top 125. Another consideration working in their favor regarding this thin but somewhat arresting Dallas draft haul is their brain trust didn’t behave or act like supercilious know-it-alls, even if they didn’t draft in lockstep with the consensus. They also managed to fill the aforementioned needs at right wing and left defense.
They began with the selection of hard-shooting Finnish sniper Emil Hemming, a top-caliber finisher with size who was one of less than a dozen European-trained forwards from the 2006 birth year to play the bulk of his draft season in an elite league. Although Hemming likely made believers out of Dallas scouts well before his second score-at-will U18 tournament effort in May, his end-of-season performance at a best-on-best competition certainly didn’t hurt his reputation. Hemming was considered first-round quality before his 2023-24 draft season and landing with the Stars practically guarantees he will be afforded every chance to permanently make the team sooner than later.
Dallas nearly had to sit out each of the next four rounds before making their first selection on day 2 at Pick No. 158, where the Stars selected tough 6-foot-4 lefty blueliner Niilopekka Muhonen, who was ranked 95th on my end-of-season listed and was far more suffocating and clean with his breakouts than he was dynamic or creative. He likely won’t produce many points beyond his crisp first pass, but that shouldn’t preclude him from taking the puck for an occasional zone-to-zone skate. Ranked 32nd among European skaters on NHL Central Scouting’s final release, it is likely teams may have soured on him for inconsistent play at tournaments, but he too played against adult-age competition in Finland, albeit over 12 games in the second-division Mestis. From my point of view, this pick satisfies the best-player-available requirement while adding a capable body to what was a thinning left side of the defense within the Stars’ prospect depth chart, which likely graduates 2022 first-rounder Lian Bichsel this season or next.
The Stars’ final pick of the 2024 draft came in the late stages of the seventh round, but center William Samuelsson offers both great value and a moderately high ceiling considering his top-line, all-situations role for a thin Sodertalje J20 lineup that was validated by his consistent scoring and effective penalty killing that helped his squad rank among the Nationell leaders when down a man. McDonnell kept mentioning that they liked the fact that William’s father Mikael was an NHL’er who had size during his NHL days and that the younger Samuelsson is a candidate to grow another inch or two even though he has a late-2005 birth date. Perhaps a good comparison for William would be Dallas' 2017 fifth-rounder Jacob Peterson, whose pronounced checking ability in the J20 continues to serve him well as a fringe NHL’er with San Jose.
MORE: 2024 Draft: Round 1 Pick-by-Pick Analysis and Grades