The Dallas Stars have just ten games left in the regular season before the Stanley Cup Playoffs start, and there is still a lot to play for. 

The Stars are currently on the hunt to catch the Winnipeg Jets who sit first in the Central Division and are six points ahead in the standings with one more game played than Dallas.

And quite frankly, the Stars have a lot of on-ice issues they need to fix in a hurry.

Since the beginning of March, their game has had issues in nearly every area. They have been struggling to score at times and also not defending well at others, which has caused the goaltending to suffer a bit.

After the trade deadline where the team added Mikko Rantanen, some of the initial issues could be blamed on having to take some time to build chemistry with Roope Hintz and Jason Robertson, but then the issues went further past the top line. 

Dallas had a stretch of two games against Winnipeg and Colorado that exposed some weaknesses in the team, which led to head coach Pete DeBoer benching the top two lines for the end of the loss against the Jets. The game against the Avalanche was a mighty struggle until the last 10 minutes of the third period, which earned the Stars a point.

After that, the issues went from just the small skid of a couple games to a more concerning stretch of games at home that resulted in two overtime wins and an overtime loss. Even though there are obvious issues in their play, the Stars are somehow 9-2-2 in the month of March. Despite the results being positive, it has not felt like the same quality on ice that the team was putting together at the beginning of the month. 

Now, with the playoffs starting in a couple weeks, head coach Pete DeBoer stated they are "running out of runway" to get things squared away, especially with a more than likely first round matchup against the high-flying Colorado Avalanche.

In the Stars most recent win against the Calgary Flames, the team still did not play well defensively, but a miraculous goaltending performance coupled with clutch scoring secured another win. The Stars used similar individual efforts against the run of play to jump out to a 4-0 lead in Edmonton the night before, which was enough to hang on for a 4-3 win.

Here are three takeaways from the two wins in Alberta: 

1) Rantanen, who has had a slow start since getting traded from the Colorado Avalanche to the Carolina Hurricanes and then to the Stars, has seemed to find some lasting chemistry with Robertson and Hintz. Rantanen had an assist in Edmonton and followed it up with a goal and an assist against Calgary. His goal was a huge insurance goal after the Flames clawed within one goal in the third period. He has four points in his last three games.

2) One of the perks the coaching staff has had the luxury of with this Stars team is having four lines to roll out evenly. Against the Flames, Rantanen had the most time on ice among forwards at 16:40 and Mavrik Bourque had the least with 11:36. Only Bourque and Evgenii Dadonov had around 11 minutes, while the rest of the forward group stayed between 14:08 and 16:40. Compare those numbers to the Flames, who spanned from Nazem Kadri at 21:09 to Kevin Rooney at 7:06. 

3) Casey DeSmith was lights out for the Stars (just like all season) and single-handedly gave them an opportunity to win the game in Calgary. Although there were two disallowed goals, the first one because it was kicked in and the second because of goaltender interference, DeSmith stopped 46 of 48 shots, giving him a save percentage of .958%. DeSmith has not lost in regulation since January 18th and only has one shootout loss during that time. 

The points are great for the Stars as they try to catch Winnipeg for the first place spot, but the issues have not corrected themselves. The Stars take on the Seattle Kraken for two games in a row in Seattle, and while Seattle is not in the race for a playoff spot, the Stars cannot squander an opportunity to get their game back into shape. 

Make sure you bookmark THN's Dallas Stars site for the latest news, exclusive interviews, breakdowns, and so much more.

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