Ranking all Six Ottawa Senators Multi-Overtime Winning Goals
Playoff overtime is one of the most unique feelings in sport, as the game, and perhaps the entire season can change for better or for worse in the blink of an eye. When it goes long, like it did Tuesday night, the stakes only intensify.
With the qualifying round over the real playoffs have begun, and so far the first round has not disappointed. In fact, Game 1 of Tampa Bay vs. Columbus alone was probably more than enough drama for one round, as the quintuple overtime thriller became the fourth-longest game in NHL history, capped off by the beautiful Brayden Point winner.
While Sens fans are probably still a year or two away from experiencing that for themselves, we can still look into the past when the team went into an extra period or three and came out victorious. In fact, the Sens have won six games that go to multiple overtimes, so today let’s rank them from worst to best.
We’ll be judging based on three categories, assigning a score out of 10 for each. The first category will be the importance of the goal, so goals in later rounds, goals that stave off elimination, or games that win the series, etc. will be given priority. Second, we’ll rate the goal itself, this one is sort of a two-parter as both the beauty of the goal as well as the impact of the scorer will be taken into account. Finally, we’ll look at the long-term impact of the goal: did it lead to more memories later in the playoffs? Does the scorer or the goal itself have a cult status among Sens fans? Etc.
In my mind, this highly scientific ranking of a largely emotional event is foolproof, so let’s dive in.
6. Matt Carkner – 2010 First Round, Game 5 vs. Pittsburgh Penguins (3OT)
Importance: Even though it was only the first round, Carkner’s goal kept the Sens alive to force a Game 6 back in Ottawa. Bonus points for being a triple-overtime game. 6/10
Quality: Alfredsson makes a nice play to find Carkner coming into the zone and Carkner winds up and gets a good slapshot off that trickles in. While Carkner didn’t have too many memories with the team, the absurdity of the scorer makes this one even better. 5/10
The next step: The Sens would lose Game 6 to Pittsburgh, which would signal the end of the team’s first era of success. Ottawa would miss the playoffs the next season for only the second time since 1996. 2/10
Final Score: To be honest I thought this would rank higher based on being the only triple-overtime victory in team history, but a goal in a first-round series that the team lost can only rank so high. 13/30
5. Mike Fisher – 2004 Round 1, Game 6 vs. Toronto Maple Leafs (2OT) 7/10, 7/10, 0/10, 14/30
Importance: Like Carkner, Fisher kept the team alive in the first round, however, with a better matchup on paper than in 2010 and it being Game 6, this goal was even bigger for a team that was still a bonafide contender trying to get over the hump. 7/10
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Quality: Like most playoff overtime goals, this one wasn’t the prettiest by most standards, but a good effort by Vermette to find the open man and Fisher being in the right position to tap it in is very nice considering the circumstances. This goal gets a bump too because Fisher spent many years as a fan favourite in Ottawa. 7/10
The next step: Awful, bad, horrible, no good. In his final game with Ottawa, Patrick Lalime gave up three goals on eleven shots and was yanked after the first period. The team suffered yet another crushing loss to the Leafs and with the 2004-05 lockout looming, it looked like the team’s window may have been at an end. 0/10
Final Score: If the team had won Game 7, this goal would be in contention for the top spot, if the team went on a deep run, it may have even taken it. Instead, the goal only delayed the inevitable heartbreak at the hands of an arch-rival, which is a shame considering its potential. 14/30
4. Colin Greening – 2013 Second Round, Game 3 vs. Pittsburgh Penguins (2OT)
Importance: After losing the first two games of the second round in Pittsburgh, the Sens came back home with a virtual must-win. It wasn’t easy, but they eventually saved their season in the fifth period. 6/10
Quality: Andre Benoit does well to get into space and fire it on the net, then Greening is there to put in the rebound on his backhand. Unfortunately for Greening, as a 3rd line type player he doesn’t earn absurdity points as Carkner did, nor does he endear himself to fans the way Fisher did. 5/10
The next step: While the team did get two more games out of the series, they were easily brushed aside by a far superior Pittsburgh team in what would wind up being Daniel Alfredsson’s last games before he left for Detroit as a free agent retired as a lifelong Ottawa Senator because anything else would have been ridiculous. 3/10
Final Score: A nice goal in at an important time, but without much else surrounding it. 15/30
3. Joe Corvo – 2007 Conference Finals, Game 2 vs. Buffalo Sabres (2OT)
Importance: This one gets points for being the only multi-overtime goal the team has scored past the second round, but it loses a few for giving the team a 2-0 lead in a series they would easily win in 5. 7/10
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Quality: Similar to the Carkner goal, Corvo makes a good shot, but since it was directly off a faceoff we can’t give any points for the build-up. Like Greening, Corvo also falls in a weird spot where he’s not a beloved player, nor so obscure that the result is semi-ironic like Carkner. 3/10
The next step: Ottawa would go on to make their first, and so far only, appearance in the Finals but would lose handily to the Ducks in 5 games. 6/10
Final Score: On its own, a double-overtime goal in the Conference Finals is huge, but there were so many other memories from that season and series that it sort of gets lost in the shuffle. 16/30
2. Todd White – 2003 Round 1, Game 3 vs. New York Islanders (2OT)
White’s goal at 0:34
Importance: While it was only Game 3 of a first-round series they would win in five, after the President’s Trophy winners dropped Game 1 to the 8-seed, going down 2-1 could have done some serious psychological damage to the fanbase and the team’s core. 6/10
Quality: This may be the ugliest goal on the list, as a nothing shot with weak deflection squeaks over the line. White, for his part, was a key member of the early 2000s teams but doesn’t quite reach the levels of admiration in the eyes of fans as some of the other core pieces of the era. 4/10
The next step: This goal helped propel the team into the next round where they dispatched the Flyers in six. With the Wild and Mighty Ducks playing in the Western Finals, the showdown between the Sens and Devils felt like the de facto Finals, which the team lost in heartbreaking fashion with the series going the full seven games. 7/10
Final Score: This goal served as a huge confidence boost for a team that was slowly gaining the reputation as playoff chokers, and it helped launch what was at that point the longest postseason run in franchise history. 17/30
1. Jean-Gabriel Pageau – 2017 Second Round, Game 2 vs. New York Rangers (2OT) 6/10, 10/10, 7/10, 23/30
Importance: The Sens took Game 1 of their second-round series to the Rangers at home, but facing a very good New York that actually finished ahead of Ottawa in the standings, a 2-0 lead was huge. 6/10
Quality: A brilliant individual effort by Pageau, who skates the length of the ice before beating Lundqvist on a 2-on-1. All of the bonus points awarded for everything surrounding this goal including Pageau’s cult following among Sens fans, the fact that he closed his eyes on the shot, and oh yeah, this was his fourth goal of the game that capped of a crazy comeback where he scored two in the last five minutes just to force overtime! 10/10
The next step: For many Sens fans, this was the moment where it started to feel like the 2017 team could be for real. They went on the beat New York in six before being on the receiving end of a double-overtime backbreaker in Game 7 of the Conference Finals against the defending and eventual Cup champion Penguins. As you probably know, the franchise went off the rails on and off the ice afterwards, but the memories of the 2017 run are still fresh in many Sens fans’ minds. 7/10
Final Score: There was really no question who would take this spot. I was so confident that I included it as the header before I even checked to see what the other ones were. Is that biased? Yeah probably, but it’s also right because the Pageau goal is the best multi-overtime goal in Sens history, hands down. 23/30