In this, the 18th season of Ottawa Senators hockey, there is a distinction on the near horizon that is so dubious that it wasn’t even matched by the lowly 1992-93 expansion club.
The Senators have never finished a season (including the lockout shortened 1994-95 season) without at least 1 player reaching the 20 goal mark.
In the previous 17 seasons, 72 members of the Ottawa Senators eclipsed the plateau commonly referred to when measuring success. The first to reach the mark was Sylvain Turgeon, who found the net 25 times in that inaugural Civic Centre season that set so many records for futility.
The club is also assured of having its lowest total for a leading scorer in team history, based on a full schedule*. Jason Spezza currently sits with a team leading 48 points, and should eclipse the 50 point mark before the end of the season. That total will still pale in comparison to the previous low of 60 points that Radek Bonk led the Senators with in the 1999-2000 season. Even the expansion team had a 60+ point man with Norm Maciver putting up 63 points. (*In the Lockout shortened 47 game season, Alexei Yashin led the 1994-95 Senators in scoring with 44 pts).
The pressure will be on Jason Spezza and Milan Michalek in the next 5 games, as both sit at 17 goals on the season. If one of these players cannot score 3 times in the next 5 games, the 2010-11 Senators will “accomplish” something that has never been done before in club history, and that is fail to have at least 1 20 goal scorer.
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