Rich Peverley’s playing days ended in a moment nobody in Dallas will forget, but his impact on the Stars has only grown since then.
On Wednesday, Peverley turns 44, and he’s still a key part of the front office that is helping steer the franchise. The organization got a player with him in 2013-14, and it eventually kept someone whose value now comes from the other side of the glass.
Peverley’s final NHL season came in Dallas, where he posted seven goals and 23 assists for 30 points in 62 games. That year was supposed to be another stop in a steady career. Instead, it became the last chapter on the ice.
In March 2014, Peverley suffered a cardiac event during a game at American Airlines Center. He had heart surgery, missed the rest of the season and never played another NHL game.
Before that abrupt ending, Peverley had built a nine-season NHL career with Nashville, Atlanta, Boston and Dallas. He finished with 241 points and 20 game-winning goals in 442 games, a solid run that also included his biggest team success.
That came in 2011, when he helped the Boston Bruins win the Stanley Cup. Across two trips to the Final with Boston, he collected 21 points in 59 playoff games.
His path to Dallas came in July 2013 as part of the trade that sent Tyler Seguin to the Stars. More than a decade later, that deal still matters in another way: it brought Dallas a future front office presence.
These days, Peverley shares assistant GM duties with Mark Janko and Scott White, who also serves as the Texas Stars’ AHL general manager. White drew league-wide attention this summer when he interviewed for the Toronto Maple Leafs’ GM opening and the Vancouver Canucks job, though he did not land either position.
Peverley’s story has become one of resilience, but in Dallas it’s also about continuity. The career that ended so suddenly on the ice has turned into a second act that keeps him right in the middle of the Stars’ push forward.
In Other News...
Stars Were Reportedly Closer Than Anyone Knew To A Blockbuster Defense Upgrade
The Stars spent at least part of the offseason in the thick of a much bigger conversation than most fans realized, with Sportsnets Elliotte Friedman reporting that a verbal agreement had been reached on a deal that would have brought Zach Werenski to Dallas. It is the kind of swing that tells you how aggressively the Stars were looking to upgrade the blue line, and how seriously another club was willing to listen before the talks started to get complicated.
What ultimately kept the move from becoming real was Werenskis preference for an Eastern Conference destination, which left Dallas on the outside of a deal that had apparently gotten much farther than expected. The reported framework also involved more than one piece going back to Columbus, underscoring just how close the Stars came to reshaping their defense in a major way before the whole thing slipped away. [Read more 🡒]