Seguin evolves from cocky kid to wise veteran 'in great place' with Stars

BOSTON -- Tyler Seguin's eyes would find his target, a bold-faced name, a superstar. The first time he remembers doing it, he was staring across at Detroit Red Wings center Pavel Datsyuk while he stretched on the ice. Seguin would watch, glued, as the aura dissolved and an intimidating presence became, merely, a human one.

He did it often in those first years, with Datsyuk, Sidney Crosby and Alex Ovechkin.

"It was about trying to realize that that's a human, that's a guy that puts on his pants the same way I do," Seguin said. "And just [understand] I deserve to be here. I want to have a great career and be a good player and start my own story.

"To get past it, I needed to stare at guys like Sid and just kind of [internalize] that, I can win a draw against him, things like that, to build my own inner confidence. … I've already stared at him. I don't need to be in awe of him during a shift. I can focus on my game."

He doesn't quite remember how it started, whether it was suggested to him by another veteran or if it occurred to him on his own, but the practice came to mind in recent seasons when he watched another phenom appear on the scene.

He passed along the idea to Wyatt Johnston, a player who calls to mind who Seguin once was, a first-round pick from Toronto entering the NHL at 19, a kid with superstar potential just at the beginning of his career.

"That was one thing that I'd sometimes do, which worked," Johnston said. "You'd stare at them and then once gametime comes, you've seen enough of them and it's, whatever,"

There is an ocean between that version of Tyler Seguin -- the cocky kid winning the Stanley Cup at the end of his first season in the NHL, the player who got taken down a peg by future Hockey Hall of Famers, the one who was shipped from the Boston Bruins to the Dallas Stars three seasons into a promising career -- and this Tyler Seguin, the veteran, the one with words of wisdom and advice, the one working on his leadership and, soon, his diaper-changing technique.

He understands who he used to be. He knows who he is now.

"It's neat to see the evolution of where he's come from, where he's at now," Stars general manager Jim Nill said. "He does have a real peace to himself, a real peace."

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It goes back a decade-and-a-half, when he was the young gun on a team full of veterans, when a likable kid was also one who needed to comprehend how a winning team is made.

It goes back to when Seguin rolled his eyes.

It was early on in that first season with the Bruins, his introduction to the NHL as an 18-year-old with all the talent in the world and an attitude to match. He got back to the bench during a game, where Mark Recchi, in his 22nd and final season of a Hall of Fame career, lit into him.

"He just reamed me and leaned into me in front of everybody," said Seguin, who will face off against his old team, the Bruins, at American Airlines Center on Thursday (8 p.m. ET; Victory+, NESN), one point from 800 since he was chosen No. 2 by the Bruins in the 2010 NHL Draft.

"I was so embarrassed. I never stared or rolled my eyes again."

When asked about the incident, Recchi laughed.

"I'm surprised he remembered that," he said. "Yeah, he was young, and we were trying to work through him and trying to work through the thing -- he needed it a little bit. It was the right time, and he understood, and it was great."

It wasn't just that moment. It built up and forced Recchi's hand.

"He wasn't picking up the equipment, he was kind of letting the trainers do everything," Recchi said. "It had built up to that and then he needed to maybe hear it. … I love the kid, and you saw everything. It was raw talent. He was talented and a good kid. Sometimes you need somebody who's been around a little bit to kind of wake you up a bit and make you appreciate what you have."

They never talked about it again.

"I had arrogance to me, for sure. It's why I was good at that age," Seguin said, "I needed to be humbled, definitely."

But it has been, as he put it, a "lifetime" since then.

He doesn't see that same arrogance among the Stars' young players, noting they're not like he was. But if they were, if they needed that, he's there to talk to them, and provide guidance and support, the weight of knowledge built over 15 years in the NHL, the burden of understanding right and wrong, of being "humbled" by the trade that shipped him out of Boston.

"He's lived it, lived on both sides," Nill said. "He was a young guy, living life, a big scorer, a good-looking guy, enjoying life. Now he's the dad."

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Now 979 games into his NHL career, 21 away from 1,000, Seguin is in the third stage of a journey that has seen him transition from the arrogant young Boston version to the high-flying Seguin-and-Jamie Benn days to who he is now, a more well-rounded, more muted player and person.

There are many reasons, from the injuries that had him relearning how to walk, to simply transitioning from his 20s to his early 30s, to a home life that has made him as settled as he has ever been. Though he is not yet ready to sit back and ponder his career -- at age 32 he still feels too young for that -- he knows that time is creeping closer, and he is more open to taking it all in.

"There was probably a season where it was still hard for me internally to get over [who] I should be," Seguin said. "I felt like I was good enough to be a first-line center, first-line PP guy, playing 20, 25 minutes a night, but then there's just this mental switch of understanding if you check your ego at the door … [it's] the depth of the team that makes your team good."

It's something that takes failure to understand, something that takes a potentially career-ending injury to get through. It was in the winter of 2020-21 when Seguin pondered whether his career might be over, a season he was limited to three games because of hip and knee injuries, after playing through a torn labrum in his hip on the road to the 2020 Stanley Cup Final, a six-game loss to the Tampa Bay Lightning.

Since then, Seguin has become a different kind of player, one with more perspective and understanding of how he can impact his team, and where he can be important.

"He's changed his game," Nill said. "He was a high-flying scorer, and he's rounded his game around. It's hard because there's a certain way he got to the League. That's how he got there, how he had success his whole life, but players get to a point in their career when the wins are more important than the points. And that's where Tyler's at now."

Though Seguin (11 points; seven goals, four assists in 10 games) is thriving on a line with Matt Duchene and Mason Marchment, he is no longer the 40-goal scorer he once was, reaching that mark in 2017-18. He is, instead, a more responsible, more conscientious, player with a two-way game he didn't always have.

"I think the pressure's probably off now in terms of being the go-to guy," said Rich Peverley, his teammate for three seasons in Boston and one in Dallas and now director of player personnel with the Stars. "I think he knows what he is. He's gotten good at what he needed to do to be a consistent player. He's obviously fantastic at face-offs and he can score. He's a trusted two-way guy.

"When he first came in the League, he was all offense. … I think Ken Hitchcock and then Lindy [Ruff] and the coaches he's had kind of established that 200-foot game and he's gotten a lot better at it. He's just an all-around player now and a guy that can score, a good player."

It's why Duchene called him "a high-end, Swiss Army knife."

"I take a lot of pride in being on the second power play or on a second or third line, putting up numbers as a group to make this team successful," Seguin said. "Because you need deep teams to win."

You also need leaders.

The Stars lost Joe Pavelski to retirement after last season, a key cog in their lineup and in the room. Others have worked to take on the roles that he held, the ways he guided them.

Peter DeBoer, in his third season as Stars coach, saw Seguin's leadership take a jump last season and that growth has continued this fall. He isn't exactly a big voice, but he's there with a point and a message, a story 15 years in the making.

"It's what makes his message resonate so much with young guys," DeBoer said. "He's been that young, immature guy and he's grown into the leader and the man he is now. I think when you've traveled that road, your message resonates a little bit more."

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It was easy, that first time. Or, if not easy, quick.

By his third season in the NHL, Seguin had made it to the Stanley Cup Final twice and won the Cup once, in his rookie season. He was too young to understand how rare that was, how many players work their whole careers and never make it to a Final, never win, retire with coulda and shoulda and voids on their resumes.

Which is why it would feel so different in Dallas.

"Totally different," he said. "Not knowing what the worth of the Stanley Cup back then was, compared to now, knowing how hard it is, I mean, it's night and day. I was a kid then."

He isn't now.

"I'm just a guy that's enjoying every day," Seguin said. "I've found the more I've gotten into my career, the more fun I'm actually having as far as just realizing that this crazy thing will come to an end and especially just enjoying the lulls."

When Pavelski arrived in Dallas, Seguin marveled at him and his ability to take what hockey gave him in stride. He wasn't discouraged when he started with three points in his first 13 games, not exactly what he wanted in his introduction to his new team and city.

"Nothing fazed him and that's the attitude I try to keep coming into," Seguin said. "It always felt so hard, and now for some reason it seems so easy. I don't know if it's like a switch that happened because I'm already at a point where I am pretty proud. I'm missing one thing and that's a championship in Dallas.

"I have a lot left in me, I still feel like. Another at least five, six, seven years, we'll see. But just realizing that I'm 32, turning 33 (on Jan. 31), I've got a baby on the way, I'm married, perspective has changed so much."

On this day, back in October, Seguin is in Boston, set to play the Bruins at TD Garden. He is standing in the visiting dressing room, a place he has played numerous times over the decade-plus since he last laced up his skates in the dressing room down the hall.

He is asked about his memories and returning to where he started his NHL career.

"So much has changed," he said.

So much has changed. In the city. In himself.

He is no longer that brash kid, the one who rolled his eyes and made a general manager doubt his future, the one who stirred controversy and scored goals. He has grown up, found his place, found his future.

"I have no regrets," Seguin said. "I would say these people probably have more regrets and it is what it is. It is what it is. Fortunately, it has been the best thing that has happened to me. Dallas is what's always been meant to be.

"I'm in a great place."

NHL.com staff writer Tracey Myers contributed to this report