Everything breaks right for Senators as storybook season continues

Exactly one year before the Ottawa Senators qualified for their first Eastern Conference final in a decade, general manager Pierre Dorion introduced Guy Boucher as the new head coach and made a surprise declaration along the way.

“One day I hope to write a book: Keys to winning in the NHL,” said Dorion on May 9, 2016. “Talent is one. Two is very good goaltending. And the third, and one of the most important is great coaching. I now feel we have all those elements in place.”

Dorion may just write have to write that storybook on the 2016-17 season — the conclusion of which is still to be determined following Ottawa’s first entry into the conference final since 2007.

Almost everything has broken right for the Senators this year, from awesome displays of talent by Erik Karlsson to terrific goaltending to Boucher’s designs taking shape. Even beyond that, there are depth additions and the surprising late season return of Clarke MacArthur.

“This is the year we’ve got to put our foot forward,” MacArthur said on the first day of training camp. “I know I get used to saying that every year, but this is the year — damn it!”

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Ottawa is not the most talented team in the conference or even close to it, but they have, perhaps outside of Sidney Crosby, the most talented player in Karlsson, a steal in the 2008 draft as the seventh defender and 15th player taken (for perspective, Colten Teubert was taken two spots higher by Los Angeles). 

The NHL has seen only 16 seasons of 70-plus points from a defenceman over the last 20 years and Karlsson has four of them — equal to Nicklas Lidstrom for most in that group. But it was evolution beyond goals and assists that rose the 26-year-old’s stock even higher this season.

“With what he’s done this year, the way he’s done it, I can’t imagine better,” Boucher said in mid-March.

Karlsson most notably emerged as the second-best shot blocker in the NHL, a telling embrace of Boucher’s “extremely defensive” ways. But equally helpful to Ottawa’s cause was Karlsson’s increased role and tremendous effect on the penalty kill, which rose from 29th last year to 22nd this year.

He was brilliant through the first two playoff rounds, racking up 13 points in 12 games.

The Sens as a whole made solid leaps as a defensive entity under Boucher, slicing off 31 goals and nearly three shots per-game during the regular season. They still gave up about the same number of even-strength shot attempts as the year previous, but blocked so many more (156 to be exact) under Boucher’s insistence.

Boucher was the first of nine candidates interviewed by Dorion, who replaced Bryan Murray as GM after last season. The first meeting, which lasted four and a half hours, clearly left a mark as did the second one which stretched on for more than eight hours.

Dorion was impressed with Boucher’s passion and potential for improving the club’s woeful defensive fortunes.

Boucher was fired less than three seasons into his first NHL coaching stop with Tampa. He tried and seemed to succeed in taking on a less-is-more approach with Ottawa.

While he exploded on the group in very public fashion during a mid-December practice — bellowing at players to do their jobs — Boucher aimed to lay off his players by speaking less, opting out of the odd morning skate and delegating more responsibility to his assistants.

“People ask me what I’m doing differently (from) Tampa. On the ice: nothing,” Boucher said at one point. “It’s not about hockey.”

The Sens still lived on razor-thin margins under his lead.

They were actually outscored by four goals in the regular season, but emerged in plenty of close games behind top-notch goaltending. Craig Anderson was mostly stellar when he played (.926 save percentage) and when he left the team to be with his wife Nicholle as she fought cancer, Mike Condon, a cheap pick-up from Pittsburgh, gave Ottawa more than their money’s worth (.914).

Trade deadline additions like Viktor Stalberg, Alex Burrows and Tommy Wingels helped Ottawa get past Boston and the New York Rangers, as well as the return of MacArthur from a concussion. The veteran winger ended the Boston series with the Game 6 overtime winner and then chipped in four assists in the final two wins over New York.

Late round picks of the Senators continued to flourish as well, including Mark Stone (a sixth rounder in 2010), Mike Hoffman (fifth rounder in 2009) and Jean-Gabriel Pageau (fourth in 2010). Trade pickups over the years, such as Anderson, Kyle Turris, Dion Phaneuf and Derick Brassard, have also shouldered big, important roles during the run.

The day before the regular season began in mid-October, Dorion met with his team for what he said would be the only time. He emerged optimistic (and, it turns out, prescient) about the group’s fortunes.

“We feel that we’re a playoff team,” said Dorion. “We hope we can surprise people once we get in the playoffs.”

Jonas Siegel, The Canadian Press

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