Gameday Preview: Texas Stars v. Grand Rapids Griffins

Texas Stars 0-0-0-0, 0 pts #-- Central Division

v.

Grand Rapids Griffins 0-0-0-0, 0 pts #-- Central Division

October 5th at 7:00 PM

H-E-B Center at Cedar Park, Cedar Park, TX

Welcome back to hockey season. It's a whole new year in Cedar Park, and the more things change the more they stay the same. Names like McKenzie, McKenna, Regner, Flynn, Dries, and Hintz have moved on, but there are new exciting faces ready to take the mantle like Calderone (below), Caamano, Mascherin, Nyberg, Gleason and more.

Tony Calderone (Credit: Texas Stars)

On Tuesday, the team openly acknowledged that they were still in search of their identity for the season. That's not a bad thing, of course. The club has yet to play a competitive game with their full roster.

The Grand Rapids Griffins come into the season with some exciting new players of their own on the roster. Filip Zadina, who was drafted 6th overall at the 2018 Draft in Dallas this past summer, will start his season in the AHL. The Red Wings are not expected to be great this season.

"They talked to me like two days ago and told me I was going down and I was like OK,” Zadina told the Detroit media. "...I probably don’t know if I was expecting this, that they were going to send me down. They did that, they made a decision and now it’s up to me. So, yeah, I will work on those things. I’ll do my best here and help the team to win games and hopefully they will call me up at some point.”

He's expected to play on the top line with Chris Terry, who led the AHL in scoring last season.

Another exciting player to watch is Givani Smith. Yes, that's the brother of now Dallas Star and former Texas Star Gemel Smith. Gemel is Givani's elder by four years. The 2016 second round pick finished up his junior career with 11-7=18 in 18 playoff games in the playoffs with Kitchener. He's a power forward and has Detroit fans excited for the future. For now, he'll get started in the AHL.

If you can't make it to the game, don't forget that AHL TV is free this weekend.

Stars injury/call up report:
None.

Website: griffinshockey.com
Twitter: @GriffinsHockey
Blog: Griffins Hockey on MLive.com