The Ottawa Senators have released their roster for this year’s Training Camp which officially opens tomorrow at the Canadian Tire Centre.
They’ll have off-ice testing and physicals on Thursday and the first on-ice session on Friday at the SensPlex.
The Sens will play their first preseason game on Monday against the Toronto Maple Leafs at the Canadian Tire Centre. The same two teams will meet the following night back in Toronto. Sens hockey now just days away!
A total of 57 players have been invited to this year’s camp including 6 goalies, 18 defencemen and 33 forwards.
Included in the list is the two players receiving Professional Tryout Agreements (PTOs) in Chris VandeVelde and Brendan Woods.
VandeVelde brings 278 games of NHL experience and could potentially push some of the guys at the bottom of the line up. Woods, a high-energy player that has spent the last five years in the Carolina Hurricanes organization, seems like he could be a useful player for the AHL team in Belleville.
A reminder that a PTO doesn’t automatically mean a contract with the organization. It will be up to these two players to make an impression during Camp and prove that they can help the organization, either at the NHL or AHL level.
The roster is also filled with young guys hoping to make a good impression over the next few weeks.
While only a couple of them are realistically in the mix for a spot with the NHL team, a strong Camp can go a long way towards a mid-season call-up should injuries strike. Senators Head Coach Guy Boucher will be getting his first real look at a lot of these guys and their performance in Camp and during the preseason games will be important in his evaluation of the player.
Thomas Chabot and Colin White both have a real shot but second tier guys like Nick Paul, Logan Brown, Filip Chlapik and Francis Perron up front along with Ben Harpur, Andreas Englund and Christian Jaros on the back end could all see NHL time this season.
The roster also includes a few currently injured players in Erik Karlsson, Derick Brassard and Ryan Dzingel. We knew about the off-season surgery for Karlsson and Brassard but apparently Dzingel went under the knife over the summer to repair an injured wrist. As of a couple days ago, he was still having trouble shooting the puck so his status leading up to the regular season is certainly in doubt.
It’s worth noting that only Karlsson and Brassard are marked as players that will miss Camp due to injury.
Also, Clarke MacArthur’s name is among the players participating . Dorion has mentioned a few times that the Doctors will want to meet with Clarke to find out where he’s at but that the current expectation of the team is that he’s good to go. Clearly this will be a story to keep an eye on over the next few days.
Will be interesting to see Clarke Macarthur’s status with OTT this year. He’ll report to camp but will he be cleared by Sens’ Dr. to play?
— Bob McKenzie (@TSNBobMcKenzie) September 13, 2017
