The National Hockey League announced today that it and the Players’ Association have agreed to a 56-game schedule, beginning on January 13. Hockey is officially back. For the Ottawa Senators, this return to play comes nearly ten months since their final game of the 2019-20 campaign. Unlike “playoff… teams that had the opportunity to participate in summer action earlier this year, the Senators and six other teams have been off since the league paused in March. To call this a long time coming would be an understatement.
With respect to the upcoming season, a few things caught my Senators-focussed eyes: 1) The All-Canadian Division The NHL’s “North Division… will consist of only the Canadian teams, as has been rumored for the last number of months. Earlier in the Fall, I used this space to write a blog about the opportunity that presents for Ottawa. To reiterate, outside the Maple Leafs, Canada’s NHL teams are a real mixed bag of mediocrity. Unlike the old Atlantic Division, in which the Bruins, Maple Leafs, and Lightning had a solid hold on the top three spots, this all-Canadian grouping is wide open for someone to surprise.
Now, it’s probably unreasonable to expect the Senators to make the jump from league-worst to playoff team; no one is – or should be – expecting that. What can be expected, though, is a step forward from a team that has clearly upgraded over the course of the offseason. Both the goaltending and forward lineups should be markedly better this year than they were last year. That fact, combined with a weaker division, could allow the Senators to look a lot more competitive than many expect.
2) The Bonus Training Camp From almost the moment the league turned the page from 2019-20 to this upcoming 2020-21 season, there has been talk of an extended training camp or potential preseason for the seven teams that didn’t get to participate in the summer return to play. The talk made a lot of sense; it’s hardly fair to expect Brady Tkachuk, Thomas Chabot, and others to be as ready to go as Brayden Point, Nikita Kucherov, and Victor Hedman.
Perhaps it’s just me viewing things through Senators-colored glasses, but the NHL’s delivery on that promise feels tremendously underwhelming. While all other teams will open training camp on January 3, the seven black sheep will have the distinct honour of opening camp on December 31. Four days in the middle of the holidays to make up the difference.
3) The Entry-Level Slide One of the wrinkles in this shortened season that is *very* relevant for the Ottawa Senators is the prorating of the entry-level slide. Ordinarily, a prospect could play up to nine games in the NHL before the tenth burned a year of the entry-level deal. With a shortened season, that number drops to six free games, with the seventh costing teams a year.
There are two competing schools of thought with respect to Ottawa, and specifically related to a player like Tim Stuetzle. First, there’s the thought that burning a contract year for a shortened season in the middle of a global pandemic seems short-sighted; the thinking goes that Ottawa should save its control over a player like Stuetzle for full seasons in a more normal environment. The alternative line of thinking is that, if Stuetzle looks ready to play in the best league in the world, the Senators shouldn’t keep him out of it.
My personal opinion lines up with the second option. As many commentators pointed out on Twitter today, any benefits from sliding entry level contracts aren’t likely to benefit the Senators to the same extent as other teams. This isn’t a cap team, and likely won’t be in the future. There should be plenty of room available to sign high-performing young players, even if it’s a year earlier.
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Let me know your thoughts on the return to play plan. As always, thanks for reading.