The Ottawa Senators are a talented team. There’s no question about that. Just about every team in the NHL would kill to have Tim Stutzle and Jake Sanderson as cornerstone pieces to build around.
While there is an equally talented supporting cast, there’s a clear downside risk. The Senators may get stuck in the mushy middle.
As we outlined in a previous piece, the so-called mushy middle is a region in which good teams find themselves stuck, unable to escape a powerful trap. That trap entails being good enough to make the playoffs, but unable to get past the first round.
Another telltale sign of the mushy middle is being a great regular-season team. But come playoff time, they can’t get over the hump. The Toronto Maple Leafs were a good example of that.
That’s why the Senators must strive to avoid becoming the Maple Leafs at all costs.
The Leafs once had a highly promising core. They had a 60-goal scorer, one of the best playmakers in the NHL, and a young blueline that dominated the artificially-created Canadian Division during the COVID pandemic.
And what came of that talented club? Nada.
That’s why the Senators cannot afford to become a great regular-season team and then flounder come playoff time. The cost of falling into that trap is just too high.
What can Senators do to avoid mushy middle?
Avoiding the mushy middle isn’t easy. Building a solid playoff contender isn’t quite as complex as some may believe. Teams going through a painful rebuild can hit solid cornerstone players just by picking high enough in the draft.
Yes, there are busts every year. But more often than not, picking in the top five a couple of years in a row can yield the sort of pieces a team needs to excel. For the Senators, 2020 was the year the team hit paydirt. That was the season the Sens picked Stutzle and Sanderson in the first round.
That said, avoiding the mushy middle boils down to surrounding cornerstone pieces with a solid supporting cast. These are guys who are willing to play a role in support of the entire team. But there’s one particular thing that all great championship teams embrace.
Ottawa must embrace team mission
If there’s one less just about every team in the NHL can learn from last season’s Carolina Hurricanes is that it takes a committed team to win championships. Specifically, coach Rod Brind’Amour sold his team a vision in which everyone played a role.
No role was lesser than another. Each role is just as crucial as another. The difference lies in the fact that if one piece falters, the entire mechanism fails.
That’s the ethos that the Senators must embrace. If Travis Green can get the sort of buy-in that Brind’Amour got from his crew, Ottawa could be a much different team come next spring. We won’t be talking about the Sens getting swept in the first round.
We could be talking about a team that’s getting ready to embrace a strong championship ethic.
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