You might have thought the 82 game season where 60 of the games were entirely meaningless was a grind but you ain’t seen nothing yet.
While 16 teams gear up for the post-season, the Ottawa Senators spent yesterday clearing out their lockers after a 31st place finish. Never has the term garbage bag day been so fitting.
The long, long off-season is upon us.
As is often the case, there were plenty of (or at least some) interesting quotes from the season-ending media availabilities.
Enough to scrape together a half-assed version of Tuesday News and Notes anyway.
-One of the note-worthy things that always comes out of the season-ending interviews is finding out which players are headed to the World Championships. The tournament will be played in Slovakia this year and it sounds like the Senators will be well-represented. Both Brady Tkachuk and Colin White confirmed they have received invites from Team USA that they are currently considering. Thomas Chabot has been asked to play for Team Canada but will have to confirm his ailing foot is good enough to play first. Cody Ceci also seemed to suggest he has an invite from Team Canada but his contract uncertainty may prevent him from going. Anders Nilsson, Magnus Paajarvi (Sweden), Christian Jaros (Slovakia) and Rudolfs Balcers (Latvia) are among the guys also expected to get invites .
-Marc Crawford also took his turn in front of the microphone and while he mentioned that he wasn’t comfortable campaigning for the job publicly, it did have that feel to it at times. Crawford is absolutely in the mix to land the Head Coaching job next season but not until Pierre Dorion has a chance to interview other candidates first. The Senators are expected to speak to as many as six guys for their vacant Head Coach position but it’s unlikely that any of them will have the resume to match Crawford. It’s a small sample-size obviously but Crawford did some good things with this group down the stretch. While I would have previously labelled him a long-shot for the position, I now feel like he has as good a chance as anyone. Pierre Dorion is expected to meet with the media later this week.
-One of the big stories out of yesterday revolved around Cody Ceci. A restricted free agent this summer, Ceci made it clear that he’s keen to avoid arbitration again this off-season and suggested that he has had some encouraging conversations with the team about a long-term extension. Bruce Garrioch seems to have echoed as much in his recent comments. Eeep. Everything the Senators have done with Ceci to this point suggests that they are still trying to determine exactly what they have in him as a player and that they still aren’t sure if he fits long-term. And their actions at the deadline certainly seem to suggest they see him as expendable. Until they make the colossal mistake of a long-term extension, I choose to believe they still see Ceci as a piece they could move this summer.
-Anthony Duclair, also an RFA this summer, made it clear that he also wants to stick around in Ottawa. Duclair made one hell of a first impression with the team down the stretch and while he originally looked like a throw-in from CBJ’s end in that deal, he has the potential to be a key piece in Ottawa’s line up next season. Duclair came into this season on a one- year, $650,000 deal so he’ll definitely be looking for a fairly significant raise over what he pulled in last year but it’s likely that the Senators will want to keep this deal fairly short-term. One or two years seems to make the most sense from Ottawa’s perspective.
-Big night for the Belleville Senators last night even though they had a day off. The Cleveland Monsters, the team Belleville is racing for that final playoff spot, lost to the Rochester Americans, burning their game in hand in the process. Both teams now have three games remaining with the BSens trailing the Monsters by just one point. Belleville holds the ROW tie-breaker. Belleville’s next game goes on Wednesday night against the Toronto Marlies.
-The NHL Draft Lottery goes tonight representing the final chapter in the 24-month long nightmare that has been the last two seasons. We have often remarked about potential “rock bottom” moments along the way but really, it’s all been leading to tonight’s stupid draw. We all know Colorado is getting that first overall pick. Everyone knows it. The Senators made the right decision by picking Brady Tkachuk last year and giving up this pick to the Avs but it’s still going to hard to watch stupid Bill Daly open that stupid card and show that the stupid playoff-bound Colorado Avalanche have the stupid first overall pick. Stupid. 18.5% has never felt like such a sure thing.
