A Historic Run and Shelving Concerns

Open up the Sens Mile!

Through the culmination of Saturday’s events, the Senators punched their playoff ticket and will take on the Montreal Canadiens in the first round of this year’s playoffs.

Meaning for the first time since December 7, 2014, the Senators finally have a use for Paul MacLean’s doppelganger, Mike Watson.

One Twitter follower had an even better suggestion:

@6thSens id seat Paul Maclean and his doppelgänger right behind therrien. Maclean is still on the payroll. May as well put him to work

— Mike SherWood (@LikeMySherwood) April 12, 2015

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It’s been such an incredibly wild series of events that got us to this point and with the excitement and anticipation that comes with playing a hated Atlantic Division rival that it’s easy to forget how special this miraculous run has been.

Irrespective of how the Senators’ season ends (and holy shit, there’s a lot of hockey left to be played), I’ve already come to terms with the fact that I will probably never see another historic run like this in my lifetime.

21-3-3.

21 wins, three regulation losses and three overtime/shootout losses all spearheaded by a 27-year old journeyman goaltender who only lost once in regulation in 23 stars (20-1-2).

This stretch of games will forever be the benchmark cited by teams that appear destined to miss the postseason near the midseason mark.

Pundits will be quick to point out how Ottawa’s success cannot be sustained and that eventually they’ll regress. The pundits are right, but no one in Ottawa really cares. Just like this offseason’s concerns for how the Senators’ goaltending situation will unfold or how the Senators will shed some redundant veterans to create more payroll flexibility for its impending RFAs, these worries have been shelved.

We’re living in the here and the now, and in playing the Montreal Canadiens, the Senators have a matchup that we can feel confident about.

Here is the schedule breakdown of the Habs vs Senators series:

• Wednesday, April 15th at Montreal, 7:00 pm ET
• Friday, April 17th at Montreal, 7:00 pm ET
• Sunday, April 19th at Ottawa, 7:00 pm ET
• Wednesday, April 22nd at Ottawa, 7:00 pm ET
• Friday, April 24th at Montreal, 7:00 pm ET (if necessary)
• Sunday, April 26th at Ottawa, 7:00 pm ET (if necessary)
• Tuesday, Apr 28th at Montreal, 7:00 pm ET (if necessary)

Other News and Notes:

• Sports Illustrated revealed their playoff power rankings and the Ottawa Senators have come in at the #2 spot behind the President’s Trophy winning New York Rangers.
• The Buffalo Sabres have fired head coach Ted Nolan. Although there’s a lot of speculation that the Sabres will take a serious run at Red Wings head coach Mike Babcock, it would hardly be surprising to see Tim Murray be reunited with Luke Richardson next season.
• Mark Stone finished the season leading all NHL rookies in scoring. Although he tied Johnny Gaudreau in points with 64, his 26 goals – two more than Gaudreau’s 24 – served as the tiebreaker. Stone also finished tied with Ryan O’Reilly for the NHL lead in takeaways with 98.
• Montreal supporters are bent out of shape because the Senators organization restricted yesterday’s pre-sale of first round tickets to season ticket holders and ‘Sens Insiders’ who registered and signed up for their email alert service. Whatever tickets remained were released to the general public this morning and apparently sold out within minutes. Maybe Montrealers should be more concerned about the health of Max Pacioretty or the fact that the last time these teams met in the postseason, Michel Therrien was vastly outcoached by Paul “I’ll play Chris Phillips 20+ minutes a night on the first defensive pairing even though it’s the year 2014” MacLean.
• According to the Ottawa Citizen, the Senators aren’t the only team that is trying to ensure that its building is filled principally by their own supporters. The Tampa Bay Lightning are restricting ticket purchases to fans who have credit card billing addresses in Florida. Just as the Senators should, the Lightning are making no apologies for acting in their own best interests.
• This past Friday, I participated in the Sens Foundation’s Celebrity Cup hockey tournament. This year’s event raised over $200,000. It was an incredible event that I would highly recommend for any business to take part in. Through the website and Twitter, I was able to raise $440, so huge thanks to my sponsors: Derek C., Donna C., Ainslie C., Ed M., Denis L., Shaila A., and Stef W. You guys are great!
• The Senators’ marketing campaign for the playoffs is ‘Young and Hungry’.
• Later this week, probably Wednesday, I’ll have an analytical piece in the Ottawa Citizen breaking down the series. Keep an eye out for that, give it some clicks and if you can leave some feedback or thoughts in the comment thread, that’d be awesome. I’ll probably also throw up a couple of other articles here leading up to the series too.