By Canadian Press

Seguin conflicted by Benn’s World Cup absence; likes Stars’ chances next season

Aug 24, 2016 | 2:00 PM

TORONTO — Tyler Seguin was a bit conflicted when he learned that his all-star teammate Jamie Benn would not play for Canada at the World Cup of Hockey.

Seguin was disappointed that he wouldn’t get to team up with Benn on the international stage in Toronto next month. But he was pleased to learn that the NHL’s leading scorer over the past two seasons would be ready to start the regular season for the Dallas Stars. 

Benn, who had 41 goals and 89 points last year, had core muscle surgery in mid-July, determining earlier this week that he would not be ready to represent Team Canada in the fall. He was replaced on the roster by San Jose Sharks forward Logan Couture.

“I know how much of an honour and how proud he is to wear his country’s colours,” Seguin said of Benn from the annual Biosteel camp on Wednesday. “(But) I also know how committed he is to Dallas. I know that decision was a tough one for him. But hearing that he’s going to be 100 per cent ready to go for the season makes you happy.”

Seguin has reason to be optimistic about the Stars’ chances for the coming season.

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Dallas had their best campaign in a decade last year, leading the Western Conference with 109 points while scoring 17 more goals than the next closest team in hockey. They fell in seven games to the St. Louis Blues in the second round of the playoffs, but the roster, led by the 24-year-old Seguin, 27-year-old Benn and 24-year-old John Klingberg (58 points last year), is young and on the rise.

The club added veteran defender Dan Hamhuis this summer and inked forward Jiri Hudler to a one-year-deal on Wednesday morning. 

Goaltending remains the biggest question mark for the Stars heading into the 2016-17 season with both Antti Niemi and Kari Lehtonen, a woeful tandem a year ago, returning to the crease. Neither netminder provided even average goaltending last season. Even a slight improvement there might catapult the club to greater heights this year. 

Dallas won its first and only Stanley Cup in 1999.

“I feel like our window’s just opened now,” Seguin said.

He said the Stars were just starting their rise to prominence, hopeful to join the perennial Cup-contending crowd.

A Cup winner in 2011 with the Boston Bruins, Seguin said getting to that next level “has to do with experience and getting that taste in your mouth of winning a playoff round, a playoff game, of losing a playoff round, playoff game and getting closer and knowing what that feels like, knowing what that atmosphere is like.”

“The goal all along is to make playoffs before the season and pace yourself properly to win a championship and I think we’ve got that taste in our mouth now,” he added.

Seguin had his third straight 30-goal season last year, with 33 markers and 73 points in 72 games, before missing most of the playoffs with a right Achilles and subsequent left calf injury. He claims to have returned to full strength in the last month and said he’s ready to represent Canada — albeit without Benn.

“I’m ready to rock and roll,” Seguin said.

Jonas Siegel, The Canadian Press