Stars forward Mikko Rantanen finished season with torn MCL; team wants Robertson and Benn back

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FRISCO, Texas (AP) — Mikko Rantanen sustained a torn MCL in his knee during the Olympics, an injury that Dallas Stars general manager Jim Nill says kept their standout forward from being himself the rest of the season.

Rantanen missed 15 games for the Stars after getting hurt while playing for bronze medal-winning Finland in February. He returned for the final 10 games of the regular season, with one goal and four assists in that span. He then had one goal and six assists when they lost their first-round playoff series to Minnesota in six games.

“Major injury. Came back, he's very competitive,” Nill said Thursday during his season-ending availability. “Did he come back too soon? Not too soon, but would have been nice to have one or two more weeks to really settle in. He never really got going again.”

In 54 games before the Olympics, Rantanen had 21 goals and 51 assists. The Stars got him in a deadline deal last season, signed him to a $96 million, eight-year extension, and he then an remarkable postseason with nine goals and 13 assists in 18 games when they made the Western Conference final for the third year in a row.

Dallas was done after one round this year, and Rantanen wasn't the only player dealing with a significant injury.

Nill said Rantanen didn’t have and won’t require any surgery, and will benefit from having some extended time off along with so many of their other players.

“We never had one game where we had a full lineup this whole season and the playoffs,” Nill said “I’ve never seen that before.”

The Stars also go into an offseason when 45-goal scorer Jason Robertson can become a restricted free agent and with longtime captain Jamie Benn pondering a decision on whether to return for an 18th NHL season, all in Dallas.

Top-line center Roope Hintz missed four games after the Olympics because of illness, then tore his left hamstring in two places on March 6 in his only game since. That was after the Stars in December lost Tyler Seguin to an ACL injury.

Miro Heiskanen, their top defenseman, missed the final three games of the regular season after an oblique tear and then sprained an ankle during the playoffs.

Radek Faksa was close to returning from a concussion in the Olympics when his foot got sliced by a skate. He got back for the last two regular-season games and the playoffs, but Nill said the significant laceration may require further surgery.

Nill said defenseman Nils Lundkvist, who took a skate to his face in Game 4 against the Wild, could have possibly returned had that series gotten to a Game 7.

“A very lucky man. The skate ended up hitting him, really hit into him more than anything,” Nill said. “He had stitches inside and outside, but he also had a concussion.”

Nill plans to reach out soon to Robertson’s agent with the focus of getting the point-a-game forward signed to a new deal.

While there were some talks last summer, and some progress was made, both sides then agreed to put those on hold until after this season.

“He’s a big part of our team. We drafted and developed him, and we want him to be a Dallas Star for the rest of his career,” Nill said.

A second-round pick by the Stars in 2017, Robertson has 490 points (213 goals and 277 assists) in 456 regular-season games. That includes three 40-goal seasons before his 27th birthday this summer, a year before he could become an unrestricted free agent.

Robertson just completed the final season of a $31 million, four-year contract he got after a training camp holdout in 2022. He played all 328 regular-season games in that stretch.

Benn has been the Stars captain since 2013-14, and like last offseason has a decision to make about whether he wants to play another season.

“We’re going to give him a couple of weeks, but I want him back. I think he wants to come back,” Nill said. “But I’m going to give him that time.”

Benn, who turns 37 in July, missed the first 19 games because of a punctured lung and his 60 games played were his fewest in a full 82-game regular season. He had 15 goals and 21 assists while playing on a one-year deal after the end of a $76 million, eight-year deal.

Hall of Fame center Mike Modano is the only player in franchise history with more than Benn’s 1,252 regular-season games, 414 goals and 992 points.

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AP NHL playoffs: https://apnews.com/hub/stanley-cup and https://apnews.com/hub/nhl