With just two games remaining before their league-mandated bye week, the Ottawa Senators are finally starting to feel pretty good about their game.
On Friday night, they staged a dramatic third period comeback against a tough San Jose Sharks team. They followed that up with a three goal victory over the best team in the National Hockey League on Saturday night. Not much has gone right for the Senators this season but this past weekend shows they still have some fight left in them.
And with 42 games remaining in the regular season, there is plenty of race track left to crawl back into the playoff picture. It’s going to take a ridiculous run but it’s clear that in the locker room, they still feel like they are within striking distance.
Right now, the second wild card spot belongs to the Pittsburgh Penguins. The Senators trail the Pens by 10 points which is a huge gap at this point in the season. Although, Ottawa does have four games in hand.
It seems doable until you realize that Ottawa basically needs to win 28 or 29 of their remaining 42 games. 57 more points should get it done. Oh and they have to pass six teams along the way.
Yikes.
As the team gets set for another back to back (home to Chicago and then in Toronto) on Tuesday and Wednesday, some Senators related news and notes.
-Over the weekend, Bruce Garrioch again stressed that the Senators have no interest in trading Derick Brassard. With the team in a bit of a free-fall, it sounded like there were a couple teams with interest in Brassard (including Columbus and Pittsburgh) but it doesn’t sound like Dorion wants to go that route. Cutting salary may still be required down the stretch but Brassard would be an odd place to start given that he makes just $3.5 mil the next two seasons and carries a cap hit of $5 mil.
-It also sounds like the trade talk around Mike Hoffman has cooled a little bit too. While Dorion apparently had at least one concrete offer (rumour was the Blues offered Jordan Kyrou and 2nd round pick), the offers haven’t been nearly enough for the Senators to consider moving one of their best goal scorers. Hoffman has looked much better the last couple games too and seems to be finding some chemistry with Matt Duchene and Bobby Ryan.
-So while rumours surrounding Hoffman and Brassard have cooled, there are still a handful of candidates to be dealt before the deadline. In particular, Zack Smith’s name seems to be coming up a bit more lately. Although the biggest stumbling block there would be the fact that Smith still has three more years remaining on his deal after this one and at $3.25 mil a season. Tough contract to move. Garrioch has mentioned on a couple of occasions that there will likely be a market for guys like Alex Burrows and Johnny Oduya but that may be a bit of wishful thinking from Pierre Dorion.
-Ottawa’s line up for tomorrow night’s game against the Chicago Blackhawks will remain a bit of a mystery until the morning. Derick Brassard, Johnny Oduya and Cody Ceci are all dealing with minor injuries and Matt Duchene has the flu. Listening to Boucher, it sounds like in all four cases it’s a bit of a toss-up. There’s a chance they may need to call someone up from Belleville later today.
-Could be some good news on the injury front though as it sounds like Mark Borowiecki is ready to return. Boucher indicated that they’ll likely wait until tomorrow to decide and it will depend on the status of Oduya and Cody Ceci, who both missed practice earlier today. Boro would bring a much-needed physical presence to the Ottawa blueline. Borowiecki hasn’t played since November 19th but up until then, was in the middle of the best season of his NHL career. Hopefully he can pick up where he left off.
-Earlier today, the Chicago Blackhawks announced that they have placed Cody Franson on waivers. Franson is a slow-footed analytics darling on an expiring contract and many seem to feel like he’s a player Ottawa could use. Add in the fact that both Johnny Oduya and Cody Ceci are injured right now, along with Chris Wideman, and it could be something the Senators consider. Ottawa is 5th in the waiver order right now. Hard to imagine Franson making it past Edmonton.
Loading …#Sens Head Coach Guy Boucher updates the media on some injuries and illnesses that have hit the line-up. pic.twitter.com/YqRH6XgKyF
— Ottawa Senators (@Senators) January 8, 2018
