The month of October is a busy one for sports – three major professional sports leagues all vying for the spotlight (four if you count pre-season NBA and five if you consider College Football). There is lots of competition for viewers, night in and night out.

To add to it’s woes, the NHL doesn’t have the assistance of a top tier major cable network broadcasting it’s games. You can say the league blew that opportunity themselves during the lockout of the 2004-05 season, if you wish, but it doesn’t change the fact that there are less viewers through VS. than there were through ESPN. It’s tough to get large audiences watching the games.

But, I’m sure a good number of folks around the metroplex were tuned in to see the Dallas Stars open their season on back-to-back nights against Columbus here in Dallas, and then on the road in Nashville on Saturday. Many critics may be writing off the Stars already, thanks to their ignominious 0-1-1 start. But (for the second time in as many weeks), I must urge you to wait on passing judgement.

Here’s the part where you say, “But it’s Columbus! And Nashville! We’ve always done well against those teams.” And you’d be right. Historically, the Stars have matched up well against both the Blue Jackets and the Predators. But, both aforementioned teams are starting to come into their own.

Investments in youth are beginning to pay off for the Blue Jackets, Rick Nash continues to lead with great play and has gotten assistance from Derick Brassard, Jakub Voracek and Pascal Leclaire, all of whom have come up through Columbus’ developmental system.

The Predators are finding success in building around a strong core of journeyman players, and are plugging in the pieces that are left through trades and free agency. The leader of the team, on and off the ice, continues to be Jason Arnott. Finding the success he always sought during his tenure as a Star, Arnie is lighting the lamp more regularly in Nashville, and has a great support crew surrounding him. People like J.P. Dumont and Martin Erat, who also struggled with other NHL teams, have found success in the Music City as well. And another former Star, Dan Ellis, has been impressive as a starting goaltender.

Starting a season winless after two games is not what the Stars want (what team would?). But I’m waiting to see how the Stars will do against Nashville in a re-match at the AAC on Wednesday, and the Blues on Thursday. It’s another back-to-back game situation, and it’s another home one night, away the next situation too. It will test the Stars, and hopefully show fans how much this teams wants success. If we’re still winless after Thursday – then it’s time to re-examine where this team is headed.

Is anyone worried?

I know it’s just the pre-season, and I know the games have been tight, and I know we’ve been evaluating talent along the way… But the fact is, the Dallas Stars have started the pre-season 1-5-1. That’s just one win out of 7 games. If this were the regular season, fans would be swallowing one heck of a collective gulp. So are you worried?

The reassuring thing is that it is just the pre-season. This is the time where teams can experiment, work out kinks and realize just where they come up short on their team. One thing the Stars haven’t lacked over the last couple weeks is shots. According to a Dallas Morning News article, the Stars have outshot their opponents 218 to 152. That’s an average of nearly 10 shots per game.

The offense is clearly getting their opportunities. The shots are plentiful – so far, the goaltenders have played well against the Stars. But, the puck is going on net. And, most reassuring of all, the rookies are the ones doing a lot of the shooting. All 3 rookies who were expected to be vying for a job have been showing up on the gamesheet. B.J. Crombeen, James Neal and Fabian Brunnstrom have all made good cases for why they should be on the roster this Friday when Dallas opens up against Columbus. One of them may start the year in the minors, simply because Dallas doesn’t have roster space.

And if you do the math, the Stars have surrendered less than 22 shots per game, on average. The defense is clearly doing it’s job. And, beleaguered by injuries, their core will only grow stronger as Philippe Boucher returns to form (Boucher has been rehabbing a toe injury he incurred because of an enthusiastic off-season training program. Then, the Stars get Sergei Zubov back in a few weeks, when he completes recovery from a hip injury. The defense looks good.

So it has to be in goal, right? Well, not so fast. Coming into this season, Tobias Stephan had played just one regular season NHL game. It was a fantastic game up in Chicago, and Stephan had the Stars in it until the final seconds of overtime when he let in his second goal of the game out of 38 shots. But, it’s one game. The guy is still only 24 years old, and adapting to the speed and skill of the NHL level. And, the other guy he split time with in net we all know well. Turco might have some rust on his hinges, but I have no doubt he’ll amaze Stars fans again this season when the games start counting.

So that’s it, fans. Nothing to worry about. Sure, it’s a slow start, and there are a few question marks. But this is a team that went all the way to the Western Conference Finals last season. They have proven they know how to win, and the pieces that are in play deserve to be there. The additions to the team have all looked good thus far. Let’s wait another couple of weeks before we panic. I think we’ll be glad we did.

The Stars opened up training camp two weeks ago, and my son and I joined several hundred other fans in getting a peek at the 2008-09 Dallas team. There was a great energy in the Frisco practice facility, even though the activities on the ice were far from game-like.

They aspired to be as organized as a pick-up game of pond hockey. It doesn’t matter though; hockey is back in Texas, and for diehard puck fans like myself and the others in observance two Saturdays ago, it’s enough to plaster a day-long smile on your face.

Watching the “stick and skate” slowly morph into offensive drills and then settle down for an informal 40:00 scrimmage, you were immediately hit by one thing: this isn’t your father’s Dallas Stars team. In the course of just two seasons, the average age of the players has come down from nearly 34 to somewhere just shy of 28. And, with the infusion of some more youth pushing to make the team this year, it may come down further still.

What hasn’t changed is the Dallas Stars approach to hockey. Coach Dave Tippett still preaches the fundamentals of a “defense-first” system. Don’t look for the Stars to change their tune and start to look like the run-and-gun Pittsburgh Penguins of last year. The players may change, but the song remains the same. The addition of skilled players does allow the Stars to be more deadly on the offensive side of the blue line. But they won’t sacrifice defense to get there.

Early last week, Tippett announced that he’d like to play around with the way he’s using Mike Modano in the offensive scheme. This is a great time to try out new ideas, and Tip may have gotten the game-winner on this one. While Modano turned into a great two-way player under former coach Ken Hitchcock (maybe the best in the league), his talents are being wasted on the checking line, which is where he was assigned last season. Going against the other team’s top line, Modano is skating back to his own defensive zone most of the time, and looking to where he can stop a play from developing, rather than developing plays of his own.

The idea Tippett has, at least as an experiment, is to put Modano on a line with Brad Richards and Sean Avery, and see what chemistry can develop. With the speed of Modano and Richards, and the physicality of Avery in front of the net, things might get explosive quick.

I know I can’t wait to see how this trial plays out in the first few preseason games. As long as the replacement center on the checking line (most likely Steve Ott) can hold down their duties, I think this is going to be a very successful move.