Sens, Habs and Leafs Headed in Different Directions

 No matter how well your team is going, as an NHL general manager, worry and anxiety are common bedfellows. Teams can be one major injury or a couple of poor goaltending outings away from singing sayonara to the post-season. Here in Eastern Ontario – and readers of this space will

Senators’ November: A Waltz to Forget

 The good? Tim Stutzle’s dancing like he’s Fred Astaire. The bad? The rest of the team’s dancing like Elaine Benes. This has not been a November to remember for the Ottawa Senators and – really - this mini-slump rich with bad rhythm and a few poorly timed one-step and two-step

The Ghosts of Ottawa’s Goalie Graveyard Rear Up Again

 One of my favourite things to bounce around my mouth is this word: Bailiwick. Definition – “one's sphere of operations or particular area of interest.” Contextually this week, we’re using it to address the netminding graveyard known as the Ottawa Senators. A ‘particular area of interest?’ You betcha. Tuesday night’s

Early season look at Senators shows improvement

 It’s a smallish sample size, no doubt. Still, a 4-2 record six games into this youngish season gives birth to optimism. Make that optimism . . . about . . . change. The Ottawa Senators godawful recent history of poor starts to the year has been documented ad nauseum. Pretty

Senators need to avoid slow start (again)

 Heard kind of an odd statement coming out of the mouth of one of my choice hockey insiders this morning. (And one Ottawa Senator fans would take issue with, no doubt). Sportsnet and Hockey Night in Canada’s Elliotte Friedman relayed to his co-host, Stittsville resident Kyle Bukauskas, that Buffalo –

NHL’s Atlantic Rich with Talent and Troubles

 It’s a relatively quiet time in the National Hockey League. Late August. Camps still a few weeks away. Outside of a Laine trade here, a Blues-Oilers offer sheet tussle there, not a whole heck of a lot rocking on. Hence, the dawning of the month-of-the-lists. TSN’s been at it. So

NHL: Where the Captaincy Really Means Something

 Outside of battling and baffling offer sheets, it’s been the hot topic in hockey this past week. It’s Toronto. It’s a new captain. And his name is Auston Matthews. Which hauls me into today’s discussion and debate – does it really, truly matter who your captain is in this day

Questions and queries surround the NHL’s East

 From shakeups to shakedowns, it hasn’t exactly been a quiet summer in the National Hockey League’s Eastern Conference. Your Ottawa Senators added in the way of veteran help (as advertised), your Toronto Maple Leafs shook up that targeted, beleaguered blueline, and your Montreal Canadiens stuck to due diligence on the

NHL Free Agency conjures Questions in Need of Answers

 By mid-afternoon on an unusually bright and sunny Canada Day (doesn’t it always rain on July 1st?), the National Hockey League was zipping along quite nicely as the free agency period opened with a slew of deals and decisions. The price tag was enormous as teams spent more than $1

Ottawa Senators: Rebuild Part II?

 “I think the Senators are going to be a really, really busy team in the off-season.” Hockey’s pre-eminent insider Elliotte Friedman (Sportsnet, HNIC) had those words earlier this week and they are all of being the following: Predictable, believable, somewhat alluring to Ottawa fans and somewhat frightening to Ottawa fans.

Curing the Blue Monday Blues

 So get this – did you realize we just passed, what is considered, the most depressing day in the calendar year? The third Monday in January is labelled “Blue Monday,” and it has nothing to do with the song by New Order. Nope. The term comes from this ‘makes-sense’ algorithm

Blue is the colour of Toronto

 It’s here. The first installment of ‘real’ hockey; hockey that matters. It’s happening and gets started Tuesday night as Vegas hosts Seattle, where-and-when the Knights unveil their Stanley Cup banner, Pittsburgh entertains Chicago where Crosby and new-Crosby face each other, and Nashville is at Tampa in the first entry into

Fresh Fish in The NHL’s Atlantic

 Last season the gun was jumped by this corner in regard to the ever-evolving Atlantic Division. Sure, the thing was evolving but not evolving as rapidly as we’d thought and forecasted. The young ones on the block – the Ottawa’s, Buffalo’s, and Detroit’s were on the move, but only incrementally.

Time to make hay, Ottawa

 The year 2017 seems like, well, a very long time ago. And in hockey speak, it really was. Five ‘very long’ seasons. To not be even competing for a playoff spot post-Christmas for that amount of time, year after year, is inexcusable, right? But there you are Ottawa Fan. And

Wacky day ends with Ottawa’s offence jacked up

 Let me get this straight, did Matt Murray just do what he seemingly hasn’t been able to do since he landed in Ottawa? That’d be, making a key save? It certainly looked that way following a somewhat crazy morning then afternoon leading up to Thursday night’s NHL entry draft. To

Hockey rolls on!

 Been there, done that must count for a lot given the lack of love the New York Rangers are getting heading into the Eastern Conference final. Across the board, hockey prognosticators are throwing their affection at the two-time Stanley Cup champion Tampa Bay Lightning. At NHL.com, some of the best

Year-end awards a mixed bag for Senators

 Pack up your things and head for the hills for the summer. The season, for the Ottawa Senators is done. And how about that season? Some advances to be sure, a few disappointments and a lot of ifs and buts. We’ve created a few categories here – as opposed to

Senators will have company in playoff chase

 If the playoffs do eventually come knocking, who steps out of the Ottawa Senator’s way? Realistically the organization would need to take a significant jump in order to rally and compete for a spot as early as next season. Could it happen? Sure, but unless Senators management can figure out

Senators vying for better grades in second half

 Give or take a few days or games or COVID breaks, the National Hockey League hits the halfway point during a very intriguing season. In Ottawa, this season was hailed as the end of the rebuild. While the phrase wasn’t exactly plastered on the facing of the Canadian Tire Centre,

Young trio making waves where waves are needed

 For right now the Ottawa Senators are awfully thin. Thinner than Twiggy, thinner than Victoria Beckham. But you know what . . . the meat that IS on the bone, is getting the job done currently. Ottawa has won four of its last five games and the locals can lay

Sigh Erik, sigh

 Photo: via senators/news/sens-beat-pens-to-get-back-into-win-column/ Erik Brannstrom must feel a lot like that shy little kid who gets selected last for a game of pick-up football. Nobody really wants him but he’s the last kid standing. Sigh Erik, sigh. Look people, it’s not like he chose this path. He wasn’t the one

String of losing needs to be snipped

 Photo: Courtesy iHeart Radio You know about that saying re-insanity right: Doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results? If you’re the latest rendition of the Toronto Maple Leafs that means, of course, nailing it repeatedly during the regular season then coughing up a hairball in

Q&A with Victor Mete ahead of the home opener against the Leafs

 By Lukas Weese (Photo: NHL.com) Victor Mete is entering his first full season with the Ottawa Senators. With the 2021-22 campaign being his fifth year in the NHL, Mete arrived to the Senators via the team claiming him off waivers last season after starting his career with the Montreal Canadiens. Over the summer,

Sens kick into high gear

 ABOVE: Pierre McGuire is the new VP of Player Development for the Ottawa Senators. The Ottawa Senators are pushing forward in rapid fashion. The first big move of the early summer (is it actually summer yet?) was the surprising hiring of long-time broadcaster and former NHL coach (he won the

Locked On Senators: A podcast for fans, by the fans

 ABOVE: Ross Levitan and Brandon Piller co-host the Locked On Senators Podcast. It was an after-class downtown Toronto subway ride in 2016 that brought two future broadcasters together. Brandon Piller and Ross Levitan, both students at the College of Sports Media, were headed home when Piller took a seat next to