Report: 15-year veteran Brenden Morrow to announce retirement in Dallas

Brenden Morrow is reportedly set to announce his retirement this week in Dallas. Morrow, 37, played 15 seasons in the NHL and came a Stanley Cup shy of entering the Triple Gold Club.

Brenden Morrow’s 15-year career may be officially coming to a close this week.

According to the Dallas Morning News’ Mike Heika, Morrow, 37, is set to make an announcement Thursday through the Dallas Stars, and it’s believed that announcement will be Morrow’s retirement. The long-time Stars captain hasn’t played a single game this season after playing the 2014-15 campaign with the Tampa Bay Lightning, and is currently an unrestricted free agent.

That Morrow is potentially set to retire as a Star shouldn’t come as much of a surprise considering all of his best years came in Dallas, and he spent his final seven seasons as a Star as the team’s captain.

Morrow was a first-round selection, 25th overall, of Dallas in 1997 and didn’t make his NHL debut until the 1999-00 season. Upon making his debut, Morrow would notch 14 goals and 33 points in 64 games, adding another two goals and six points in 21 playoff games as the Stars, who were defending Stanley Cup champions in Morrow’s rookie season, fell to the New Jersey Devils in six games in the final.

Over the next 13 seasons, Morrow would go on to become one of the faces of the modern-day Stars. He posted seven 20-goal seasons as a Star, including two seasons in which he eclipsed the 30-goal plateau. Morrow’s best offensive season came in 2007-08 when he scored 32 goals and 74 points in 82 games, finishing in the top-10 for Selke Trophy voting as well as earning votes for the Lady Byng Trophy and the end of year all-star team.

When he was in the final season of a six-year, $24.6-million deal with the Stars, Morrow moved on to the Penguins as a deadline acquisition and helped Pittsburgh to an Eastern Conference final. The Penguins were swept, however, and Morrow spent the next two seasons chasing a Stanley Cup. He first landed with the St. Louis Blues but exited in the first round in 2013-14, and then inked a one-year deal with the Tampa Bay Lightning, but that season ended with a defeaet in the Stanley Cup final.

Morrow came a Stanley Cup shy of entering the Triple Gold Club in his career, and he was a champion at nearly every level. In 1997-98, Morrow won a WHL Champnionship and Memorial Cup with the Portland Winter Hawks. Internationally, he won World Junior silver in 1998-99, as well as World Cup and World Championship gold in 2004. Morrow was also part of the 2010 gold-medal winning Canadian Olympic team in Vancouver.

If this is the end of his career — and that seems the likeliest of scenarios — Morrow will hang up his skates with the fifth-most games played in Stars franchise history, trailing only Sergei Zubov, Jere Lehtinen, Neal Broten and Mike Modano. Morrow’s 243 goals are tied for seventh-most in franchise history, he ranks second in franchise history with 43 game-winning goals and his 528 points are eighth-most as a Star. In addition, Morrow’s 78 games played are 10th most in Stars franchise history.