What the Ottawa Senators are thankful for in 2023-24

Amid the holiday season, PHR will be taking a look at what teams are thankful for in 2023-24. There also might be a few things your team would like down the road. We’ll examine what’s gone well in the early going and what could improve as the season rolls on for the Ottawa Senators.

Who are the Senators thankful for?

Brady Tkachuk.

Much like his brother, Tkachuk has quickly become the emotional, physical, and on-ice leader for the Senators. Leading the team in goals, shots, hits, and even penalty minutes, his willingness to put his body on the line shows that everything goes through Tkachuk in Ottawa.

Unfortunately for him, and what has become a boiling problem with the fan base, Tkachuk is now in his sixth season with the organization and has yet to make a playoff appearance. Yet, even through the emotional turmoil that several unsuccessful seasons can put on the organization, Tkachuk has a lot of hope the Senators can turn things around soon.

In early November, in an article from Bruce Garrioch in the Ottawa Sun, Tkachuk was quoted as saying, “I understand that they’re passionate fan base and I understand that they love it, but when you face adversity you don’t turn your back on the guys out there. We’re playing hard, I know it’s frustrating right now. It’s not like we’re giving up out there, we’re fighting right to the very end“.

Even if the situation in Ottawa continues to become more dire, and the team is unable to produce a consistently successful team in the short term, Tkachuk’s loyalty is long-lasting. His desire to protect his teammates both on and off the ice is a tremendous boon for a struggling franchise.

What are the Senators thankful for?

Their top-six.

Even though the Senators are in last place in the Atlantic Division, there have certainly been some bright spots that the team can be thankful for. The top of their forward core, primarily led by Tkachuk, Joshua Norris, Drake Batherson, Tim Stutzle, Vladimir Tarasenko and Claude Giroux are still producing at a solid rate.

As the team exits the holiday season, it sits 10th in scoring across the entirety of the NHL, averaging 3.41 goals a game. Producing at a higher clip (albeit with fewer games played) than the likes of the New York Rangers and Vegas Golden Knights shows that Ottawa does have the talent up front to be competitive in the league.

Unfortunately for them, the players behind them have not been holding up their end of the bargain, as the defense and goaltending have both plagued the Senators for much of the season. Even with the team scoring at such a high rate, and GA/G average of 3.55 places them in the bottom five of the NHL, showing where most of the struggles are coming from.

What would the Senators be even more thankful for?

Stability.

In time, stability will come for the Senators and the organization will begin to normalize and stabilize with their current conditions. However, in under the year, the franchise has seen the team being sold, their longtime General Manager showed the door, and what appeared to be a player-friendly coach ousted as well.

The expectation heading into the season is that Ottawa was one of the few teams poised to come out of a lengthy rebuild, with a lot of the finishing touches put in place with the addition of Jakob Chychrun last year, with Tarasenko and Joonas Korpisalo brought in this past summer. Now with a new ownership and management group taking over, the team looks to have halted their rebuilding process entirely.

There is every possibility that the new management group, primarily led by former player, Steve Staios, did not agree with the direction that former general manager Pierre Dorion was taking the franchise. Now, with what is shaping up to be another disappointing season in Canada’s capital, it is now time for Staois to redirect the team in the right direction.

What should be on the Senators’ holiday wish list?

A revamped bottom-six and defensive help.

As previously mentioned, the top half of the Senators offense has been quite productive this season, sporting some of the better forwards across the league. Nevertheless, the bottom half of their entire forward unit has been entirely unproductive this season, as well as the bottom of their defensive core.

The team has ultimately been without all-star defenseman Thomas Chabot for much of the year due to injury, but could still benefit from adding a defenseman such as Mario Ferraro from the San Jose Sharks. In the case of the forward core, the Senators still do have prospects they could look to for a jolt of youth into the lineup, but could take a page from the book of their former Ontario rival.

In his first season as president of hockey operations for the Pittsburgh Penguins, Kyle Dubas took an incredibly aggressive approach to filling out the team’s bottom-six this past summer, signing several veterans to minimum salary two-way contracts. Although it hasn’t entirely worked out for Pittsburgh at this point, with an enhanced scouting department, this could be the kind of aggressive approach the Senators could deploy to fill out the bottom of their roster more appropriately.