Ottawa Senators: Three most important players for this season

Everyone in the hockey world is expecting the Ottawa Senators to have another hard season, and to once again finish at the bottom of the standings. If the Senators are going to remain competitive on most nights, they are going to rely on three players.

It has been a long and tumultuous road for fans of the Ottawa Senators to get to where the team is today. Going all the way back to the trade deadline two seasons ago when reports first started to surface that the Ottawa Senators were taking calls on Erik Karlsson, then seeing Erik Karlsson getting traded on the eve of training camp last season.

The team was in a self-professed rebuild and they were looking to accumulate young assets and picks. The team spent the majority of the season at the bottom of league standings, and when the trade deadline arrived fans saw the team move Mark Stone, Matt Duchene, and Ryan Dzingel. Compound all that with the fact that the Ottawa Senators had to watch the Colorado Avalanche step up to the podium on draft night in their place.

BUT THIS IS A NEW SEASON! THIS IS A DIFFERENT TEAM! WE HAVE A NEW COACH! I’m trying my best to be excited about this coming season, and the recent Thomas Chabot extension definitely helps, so I’m going to be as positive as I can this season.

So, with positivity in mind, these are the three players I believe the Ottawa Senators will rely on to remain as competitive as possible on a nightly basis.

Brady Tkachuk

The young forward is entering his second season with the Ottawa Senators. After putting up 45 points in his rookie season, including 22 goals, I would be expecting him to improve on those numbers this coming season. The 6’3″ power forward has a lot of grit and skill, a combination that any team would love to have, and you know he is going to get under the skin of a few opposing defenders that will result in a few powerplays for the Senators. Not to mention that the second the puck enters the offensive zone and Brady Tkachuk is on the ice he heads straight to his office in front of the goaltender, so you know he is going to have access to a few rebounds to simply tap in.

Going beyond his apparent skill on the ice, we can’t underestimate the impact that he has off the ice. The club is clearly looking to him to become a leader on this team, and you can tell he has stood up and taken that role on. While he isn’t wearing a letter this season – and he very well could have been – I firmly believe that you don’t have to wear a letter to be a leader on a team. I believe that Tkachuk is one of those young leaders that DJ Smith talks about. When looking at the players with letters this season, I fully expect one or two of them not to return next season which would open up a letter spot for Tkachuk.

His personality is one that is contagious for the guys around him, and not to mention that he leads by example when he is on the ice. He is one of the most hard-working players on the team when he is on the ice. You have to love his work ethic and his commitment to playing hockey “the right way,” whatever the right way may be!

Thomas Chabot

The recently extended young star defenceman is by far the best player on the backend for the Ottawa Senators. Chabot was one of the most explosive offensive producing defencemen in the NHL last season. If the Senators are ever going to be competitive this season they are going to need Chabot to continue playing like he did last season, and even improve on his play from last season.

His ability to create offence from the backend is critical for this team going forward. We can’t overlook his ability to transition the puck from the defensive zone to the offensive zone. For this team, he is the equivalent to a quarterback in football. I very much expect pretty much everything this team does to, at some point, go through the young defender.

Just like was the case with Brady Tkachuk, I believe Thoma Chabot could have worn a letter for the Ottawa Senators if the club had decided to have their young players be in such a position. Like I wrote for Tkachuk, I believe that Chabot is one of those young leaders that the team likes to boast about. I repeat what I said for Tkachuk, you can be a leader on a team without wearing a letter on your jersey and Chabot is one of those players. The future captain of this team is going to be either Tkachuk or Chabot, and realistically they couldn’t go wrong with either.

Craig Anderson

The Ottawa Senators’ number one goaltender is entering the final year of his contract, and at the age of 38, we don’t really know how much he has left in the tank. Anderson’s history is a pretty interesting one, considering that he usually would have a good season followed by a mediocre season and then would bounce back with a good season. That has been a trend for much of his time here in Ottawa, with the exception of the last two seasons. Considering the team that was playing in front of him for the past two seasons, it is pretty easy to understand why the netminder had back to back bad seasons for the Ottawa Senators.

If the Ottawa Senators are going to be competitive this season and not fall apart and finish at the bottom of the standings again, they are going to need their goaltenders to play very well each and every night. If this team is to have any success on a night to night basis, Craig Anderson is going to have to play much better than he did the last two seasons.

I think Craig Anderson has the ability to be the most important player on this team once again this season. If he is able to reclaim some of his former magic in the net, and if he is able to steal some games for this young team, then Anderson will definitely be considered one of – if not the – most important players on this team. Going further than that, I don’t think this team is going to need him to steal games mainly because of the situation this team is in. If he is able to keep this team in games on a nightly basis then it will have been a successful season for Anderson.

It is no secret that there is a very real possibility that the Ottawa Senators will once again finish at the bottom of the league, even if these three players play their minds out throughout the season. With that being said, even with all the hard times that Ottawa Senators fans have had to live through over the past few seasons, there is absolutely no doubt that the future is bright in Ottawa. There are a lot of good young players in this organization’s pipeline, and I would assume that there are going to be more coming in the future. The commitment that fans have seen from Colin White and Thomas Chabot should help ease some of the belief by Sens fans that players don’t want to play here in Ottawa. Here’s to hoping that the future is indeed bright for this team!