Mikko Rantanen has to be one of the most petty hockey players in recent memory... in the best way possible. His competitive (and vindictive) spirit single-handedly saw his new team, the Dallas Stars, through to the second round of the Stanley Cup playoffs.
Rantanen scored a hat trick in Game 7 of the Stars' first round series against the Colorado Avalanche, his former team. The 28-year-old right winger was traded out of his long-time home to the Carolina Hurricanes due to stalled and soured contract extension negotiations. He ultimately forced Carolina to flip him to Dallas ahead of the March trade deadline.
The Stars are certainly happy things played out the way they did and now they have a furious Rantanen on their roster who is out for blood in the playoffs and long after.
Mikko Rantanen wants to haunt the Colorado Avalanche forever
Reports indicate Colorado and Rantanen were only $500,000 apart when negotiations fell apart. When maneuvering himself into a new home, Rantanen apparently wanted to play for a team that would frequently face his old club.
"You know what Rantanen says? I'm going to Dallas. You know why I want to go to Dallas? Because I want to jam it down Colorado's throat," Sportsnet's Nick Kypreos said on Monday's edition of Real Kyper and Bourne. "I want them not only, do I want to play them in the playoffs, I want to go in for the next eight years into that organization three times a season. And they got to look at me because I'm coming after them. Those were his words in a roundabout way."
On Wednesday, Rantanen notched his second consecutive hat trick in Game 1 of the Stars' second round series against the Winnipeg Jets. He became just the third player in NHL history to do that in the playoffs and the first since Jari Kurri in 1985.
A HAT TRICK FOR MIKKO RANTANEN 😱
— ESPN (@espn) May 8, 2025
IT'S ONLY THE SECOND PERIOD 😳 pic.twitter.com/JxCmKlnuMj
His seeming hatred for the Avalanche front office (not his former teammates) has sparked a stretch of red-hot play that could potentially carry Dallas deeper in the playoffs. If you're a Colorado fan, good luck sleeping at night knowing you could've still had that guy on your team instead of watching him terrorize the rest of the Western Conference bracket.