Today, the 2025-26 NHL regular season will officially start. Three games are on the NHL schedule for the start of the new season.
However, the Ottawa Senators will have to wait until Thursday night to start their 2025-26 season when they travel to Benchmark International Arena to face the Tampa Bay Lightning at 7 p.m. ET.
When a new season arrives, all 32 teams will get a power ranking to see how good they are projected to be for the season. For the Senators, they had their latest power ranking newly revealed with the new season arriving tonight.
Senators ranked in the top 15
Today, Lyle Fitzsimmons of Bleacher Report wrote an article titled "NHL Power Rankings for Every Team on Opening Night 2025." Fitzsimmons ranked the Senators at 13 for his power rankings.
"Year one of Travis Green's stint behind the Ottawa bench ended in a first playoff birth since 2017, and there's reason to expect improvement, primarily another year with goalie Linus Ullmark, who had 25 wins and four shutouts in 2024-25," Fitzsimmons said about the Senators.
Green did shock people by turning the Senators around in his first year as head coach. In the end, Green finished sixth in Jack Adams voting in 2025. Along with Green, Ullmark turned into the top goaltender the Senators had been waiting for years. Ullmark became the first Senators goaltender to win 25 games in a season since Dominik Hasek did back in the 2005-06 season.
Along with Green and Ullmark, there's more talent on the Senators roster. Captain Brady Tkachuk will be at it again with his other long tenured teammates Thomas Chabot and Drake Batherson. Both Chabot and Batherson had big seasons in 2024-25.
Of course, the Senators young core will be a key factor again. Tim Stutzle, Jake Sanderson, Ridly Greig, Dylan Cozens and Leevi Merilainen are all expected for big seasons.
Cozens and Fabian Zetterlund were both trade deadline acquisitions last season, and the two of them each heading into their first full season as a Senator.
With losing in the first round of the playoffs last season to the hated Toronto Maple Leafs, it can be used as extra motivation for the Senators. Losing to a hated rival will always give teams extra fuel for a bigger season.
With injuries hitting the two-time defending Stanley Cup champion Florida Panthers before the season, and the defending division champion Maple Leafs losing Mitch Marner this off-season, the Atlantic Division is open to be won in 2026.
With how last season went and the players on the roster, there is reason to believe the Senators can make bigger things happen in 2025-26.