Students often experience the university period as a very stressful time. The teacher is a key figure who can cushion this stressful experience for the student. This study therefore aims to analyse the influence of teachers from the Self-Determination Theory perspective on academic stress, motivation, critical thinking, metacognitive strategies and academic performance in university students. The study involved 2456 university students with an average age of 22.51 years. A structural equation model was created to analyse the causal relationships between the variables. The results showed that the psychological controlling of the teacher positively predicted academic stress while autonomy support negatively predicted academic stress. Academic stress negatively predicted motivation, metacognitive strategies, critical thinking and academic performance. Academic motivation positively predicted metacognitive strategies and critical thinking. Finally, metacognitive strategies and critical thinking positively predicted academic performance. These results highlight the importance of the role that the teacher adopts during classes and the protective factor of academic motivation in the presence of stress.