The Senators prove an NHL season can be won or lost in just 11 games

by Peter Raaymakers on Feb 13, 2011 7:00 AM EST in Analysis

In the 2009-10 season, the Ottawa Senators went on an unprecedented 11-game winning streak from January 14, 2010 to February 11, 2010. The streak catapulted the Senators up the standings, from eighth place in the East up in to fourth. It also proved to Bryan Murray that that team was playoff bound, and with a fairly open Eastern Conference at the time, pushed him into being a buyer at the trade deadline. One Feb. 12, after the streak had reached 11 games, Murray went out and acquired 11-year veteran Matt Cullen from the Carolina Hurricanes. On paper, the team didn't look like a serious contender, but on the ice, they were playing like one.

Almost exactly a calendar year later, though, and the opposite has happened. After plodding along for much of the first half of the season, and 11-game losing streak from January 14, 2011 to February 9, 2011 has sunken the Senators well out of the playoff picture, from 13th in the east (admittedly a poor position to begin with) right down to the bottom of the conference, and closing in quickly on last overall. That losing streak, above all, has proven to Murray, Eugene Melnyk, and the rest of team management that this team isn't, in fact, a contender, and that a a drastic rebuild of the organization is required to become truly competitive once again. On Feb. 11, after the streak had reached 11 games, the Senate Reform had begun in earnest: The team traded 11-year veteran Mike Fisher for nothing but draft picks, the trading currency of rebuilding teams.

The parallels are uncanny, if the directions were reversed.

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THIS WHOLE SEASON IS MATT CULLEN'S FAULT

Silver Seven - The Daniel Alfredsson of Ottawa Senators Blogs

by Mark Parisi on Feb 13, 2011 10:25 AM EST reply actions

Classy move Mike

Fisher took out a full page ad in the Citizen today thanking the fans for his stay this city.

page C8.

Dear Senators Fans and Fellow Citizens of the Ottawa Area.

Foe the past 11 years I have had the pleasure of calling Ottawa my home.
I have matured here both as a hockey player and a person. Throughout my
time in Ottawa the fans of the Sens and the entire community have been a
tremendous support to my teammates and I through good times and bad.
It was my honor to be able to give back in some small way by working with
Roger’s house and many other worthy groups. Individuals and causes in and
around Ottawa

I am extremely blessed to have had the privilege of being a member of
your community. The friendships I have forged here are ones that I will remember
and cherish.

Ottawa is a tremendous city and I will miss playing in front of you every night.
Though I am sad to be leaving, I am very grateful to the Ottawa Senators Hockey
Club for giving me the chance to realize my dreams of becoming an NHL player.
In particular, I would wish to thank Mr. Eugene Melnyk and Bryan Murray for their
respect, professionalism and the generosity that they have shown to me and my
family through the years. It was a lot of fun playing in front of some of the greatest
hockey fans in the world, and that will never be forgotten.

For everything that you have done for me and my family, I did not want to leave Ottawa
without expressing my sincere gratitude and appreciation to the entire community

On behalf of Carrie and I and our families

Thank you Ottawa….For everything.

MIke Fisher

by paulbeam on Feb 13, 2011 11:19 AM EST reply actions 2 recs

Always Classy

by Hockey Playoff Run SensFan on Feb 13, 2011 11:26 AM EST up reply actions

Rec'd

by JonathanA on Feb 13, 2011 11:26 AM EST up reply actions

Mike Fisher = Roy Halladay!?

Trying to be Erik Karlsson's agent since October, 2010.

by Adnan on Feb 13, 2011 11:46 AM EST up reply actions

So much disapointment

If only our rising stars had delivered. Regin, Foligno did not live up to last years promising ending. Michalek in my opinion is the biggest disappointment. It took half the season for him to become a threat again, if they don’t trade him he will be worth watching next year and him and Spezza will be this teams only entertaining players. Of course Winchester, Shannon and Smith will provide some excitement but will not be scoring threats every night.

by Hockey Playoff Run SensFan on Feb 13, 2011 11:26 AM EST reply actions

You forgot Karlsson

He leads us in points (as a defenceman). His plus/minus may be horrendous, but it’s not fair to him to play on the top pairing with a struggling defenceman.

Trying to be Erik Karlsson's agent since October, 2010.

by Adnan on Feb 13, 2011 11:49 AM EST up reply actions

Michalek is the biggest disappointment because his body didn't heal fast enough for your expectations?

That’s really unfair.

Regin and Foligno really didn’t come through after some promising signs, but Michalek was returning from a devastating knee injury.

Silver Seven - The Daniel Alfredsson of Ottawa Senators Blogs

by Mark Parisi on Feb 13, 2011 12:47 PM EST up reply actions

Yeah,

I have nothing against Michalek for his bad start. That’s a really, really serious knee injury that he suffered. We saw what it did to Cowen at the WJC two years ago, and nobody is going to be fine (particularly when their game is built on speed) when they just return from that injury.

Silver Seven: the Daniel Alfredsson of Ottawa Senators blogs.

by DarrenM on Feb 13, 2011 1:32 PM EST up reply actions

It's a business

What have you done for me lately. It’s not his fault for getting injured just one of the many things that went wrong and stayed wrong too long

by Hockey Playoff Run SensFan on Feb 13, 2011 7:51 PM EST up reply actions

As someone who’s gone through an ACL construction I hardly fault Michalek for a slow start, same with Kovy. It took me a full year of playing soccer before I felt right again, so I don’t find it shocking that it’s taken Michalek and Kovy 6 months to find their games again.

You can look at Jered Cowen too, where he had a pretty bad post ACL reconstruction season last year and a full year later he’s back dominating in the CHL again.

At least those 2 have excuses, the rest really don’t have one.

modsuperstar dot ca | SlideawayMedia

by modsuperstar on Feb 13, 2011 3:18 PM EST up reply actions

Yeah, I know the "official" recovery time for an ACL tear is about 6 months

But I’ve heard that most people need a full calendar year to really feel their strength has recovered. Technically, Michalek is ahead of schedule.

Silver Seven - The Daniel Alfredsson of Ottawa Senators Blogs

by Mark Parisi on Feb 14, 2011 4:00 PM EST up reply actions

Comment from On the Forecheck:

Mike FISHER played great for his 1st time in a Preds jersey. An assist, even if it was an EN, killed any chance of a comeback and a +2 on ice is a GREAT start. His -19 was more of how bad the Sens are this year more than his play. Let’s face it, a loss in front of ANOTHER sold out home crowd would’ve been a downer. I think the Preds will finally make it past the 1st round and prob make a deep run. This is a good time to be a Preds fan!

i agree, i really think that the +/- stats are thrown out of wack due to everything sucking this year.

by Ary Maharaj on Feb 13, 2011 11:55 AM EST reply actions

We will win 11 in a row next year!

But seriously, I know everyone seems to think it will take 2-3 years, but I think we can make the playoffs next year. Everything that went wrong this year, did go wrong but consider this:

Thinks that can easily go better

- Regin could return to 2009-2010 form instead of 2010-2011. It would not be a shocker if he did
- Michalek stays healthy and picks up on 2nd half of this year
- Karlsson, in his 3rd season, gets better defensively and gets around 50 points
- Gonchar has a better season than this year
- Spezza stays healthy the whole year
- our #1 draft pick gets 30-40 points
- someone from the AHL has a solid year

Things that likely won’t get better
Daniel Alfredsson. Let’s face it, we love him and all but he isn’t getting any younger. He’s on his last contract and if he doesn’t retire after next season, the year after is surely his last. He is going to hopefully have a reduced role, but I would love for him to play in the playoffs for us one last time. We don’t really have to sacrifice the future to make this happen either.

Okay goaltending is still a question mark, but if we can get even decent GAA (around 2.6 or 2.7 GAA) between Lehner and a free agent veteran, we can be a bubble team.

This team really isn’t that bad as it was this year. And sure I am hoping a lot of things go better, but I think they went unrealistically bad this year, so it wouldn’t be surprising if a lot of things went better relative to this year.

Also, all of these things assume we don’t get better in any trades in the offseason utilising our cap room. So yes I think we can make the playoffs next year with younger players.

Trying to be Erik Karlsson's agent since October, 2010.

by Adnan on Feb 13, 2011 11:59 AM EST reply actions

I said a lot of these things THIS year

But for every thing that might go right, you’ve got something else that might go wrong. Hopefully what you outline does go right, though; we should be competitive if they do!

An Ottawa Senators fan blogging at www.silversevensens.com

by Peter Raaymakers on Feb 13, 2011 12:05 PM EST up reply actions

It's all going right relative to this year

Relative to the season before, it’s more or less status quo.

I just see no reason why we would have to suck forever Islanders/Oilers style.

Trying to be Erik Karlsson's agent since October, 2010.

by Adnan on Feb 13, 2011 12:08 PM EST up reply actions

There was/is something broken on this team

This team is less than the sum of its parts, and has been for a while.

Senate Reform is important if only to flush whatever the constipation is out of the system.

by Tom Camps on Feb 13, 2011 12:25 PM EST up reply actions

Ironic that last year they were more than the sum of their parts

I think they’re not as bad as this year and not as good as last year. An injection of some new blood should have a positive effect.

Silver Seven - The Daniel Alfredsson of Ottawa Senators Blogs

by Mark Parisi on Feb 13, 2011 12:51 PM EST up reply actions

Just being an optimist with regards to my team I’d like to think we could pull a Flyers style 1 year rebuild.

What has to go right
- A young and talented d-corps has to mature on the fly
- We get average to above average play from our goaltending tandem

Really when you look at what happened to this team is a total collapse in our goaltending and defense. Elliott provided us average to above average goaltending for a decent spell last year. This year we have gotten average to well below average goaltending across the board. We no longer had A-Train providing crazy shot blocking, so it caused a trickle down effect within the d-corps, which meant our mediocre goaltending was having to face more live shots. And even when the shots were kept down our keepers haven’t been up to the task.

This team needs to forecheck and work hard to win games, but if the goaltending can’t be leaned on to not give up backbreaking goals it means the team has to sit back a bit more and not get bodies deep to pins teams in their own end. When they’re not forechecking then they’re not applying offensive pressure, which means less goals.

If we could get a tender to come in and play at an average level that would be an improvement. Even though I do like Brian Elliott I think the team has to move on from him, as I believe his confidence is shot, as well as any confidence his teammates might have had in him.

I think players like Foligno and Regin have a higher ceiling than we’ve seen so far. I think if we spend our money wisely we could turn this around pretty quickly. Could we find more production for $5 mil a year than Kovalev? Yes. Could we find better d production for $3.5 mil than Phillips? Probably. Could we get better production for $3.8 mil a year than Pascal Leclaire has given us? Definitely.

I can’t say I’m someone who is necessarily vouching for the quick fix solution, but I definitely fall into the category of this team not being nearly as bad as they’ve played this year.

modsuperstar dot ca | SlideawayMedia

by modsuperstar on Feb 13, 2011 5:42 PM EST up reply actions

I think even if Phillips was resigned at 3.8 mill a year, it wouldn’t be the end of the world. Kovalev and Leclaire open up almost 9 mill in cap space. Add in Fisher’s 4.2, and we’ve got a lot to spend on free agents.

by The Tif on Feb 13, 2011 8:10 PM EST up reply actions

If Phillips was resigned at 3.8 million/year

It would be the worst signing in Senators history. At least Kuba was decent when he got an extension.

Trying to be Erik Karlsson's agent since October, 2010.

by Adnan on Feb 13, 2011 9:53 PM EST via mobile up reply actions

I know quite a few around here felt Fisher was overpaid, but I wasn’t one of them. I think finding someone that brings to the table what he does for $4.2 mil might be tough to replace. Obviously we have an internal candidate in Z. Smith who is of a similar mold and a lot cheaper, but it’ll be a few years before he’s the total package like Fisher.

modsuperstar dot ca | SlideawayMedia

by modsuperstar on Feb 13, 2011 10:53 PM EST up reply actions