Toronto Maple Leafs: How the Senators Will Fare In Canadian Division
There’s a chance the Toronto Maple Leafs play in an all Canadian division
The COVID-19 pandemic is still running wild in the world we live in today. It has shutdown the United States-Canada border for unessential travel which includes professional sports of all kinds.
Since this is the case, if the National Hockey League does indeed end up having a season, there’s a strong chance that the Toronto Maple Leafs and all the other Canadian based teams will be placed in one division to prevent having to cross the border.
If the all Canadian division does end up happening, one of the teams the Maple Leafs will have to often face is the Ottawa Senators.
Toronto Maple Leafs/Senators all time history
The Toronto Maple Leafs and Senators have played each other a total of 147 times with the teams having an even record against each other of 72-72-3. (Wikipedia.com).
As the Senators became a franchise in 1992, they didn’t get their first win against the Leafs until the 1996 season when they beat them 6-2. That game ended up being the first of four straight wins against the Leafs.
These two teams have seen each other in the playoffs four times with all but one of these matchups coming in the first round. The Senators have lost all their playoff matchups to the Leafs which included a sweep in the first round of the 2001 playoffs.
In the 2020 season, the Toronto Maple Leafs swept the Senators in their three game series beating them 5-3 on opening night, 2-1 in overtime on February 1st and 4-2 two weeks later on the 15th. They were set to face each other for a fourth time in Ottawa on March 28th but that matchup ultimately never took place due to the postponement of the season because of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Senators 2019-20 season
As the pandemic put a hiatus on the 2019-20 NHL season, all teams played less than the original anticipated schedule of 82 games. The Senators managed to get 71 games in going 25-34-12 with 62 points.
They finished seventh in the Atlantic Division with a goal differential of -52.
Brady Tkachuk led all Senators players in points with a total of 44. He also led the team in penalty minutes spending 106 minutes in the box and shots on net with 259, 73 more than the next player. Another statistical category Tkachuk led his team in was hits which he got a whopping 303. (hockeyreference.com)
Despite being traded at the trade deadline, Jean-Gabriel Pageau scored the most goals in a Senators uniform with 24. Of those 24 goals, five of them were game winners which also led the team. He also had the best shooting percentage with a mark of 17.8% and best faceoff percentage winning 53.2% of puck drops.
Thomas Chabot got the most helpers with 33. He also got the most powerplay points with 11 which all of them were assists.
Former Maple Leaf Nikita Zaitsev led the Senators in blocks during the 2019-20 season with 121.
Departures
The Senators have allowed a few players to walk in order to test the open market. While they can bring them back, it doesn’t seem like they will attempt to.
The biggest departure from the Senators 2019-20 roster that is no longer apart of the team is probably Anthony Duclair who represented the prganization at the all-star game. He scored 23 goals and added 17 assists on top of that for 40 points.
Duclair’s departure was a bit of a mess on both ends as he fired his agent when he didn’t have a contract and the Senators failed to tender him one making him an unrestricted free agent. He still doesn’t have a contract for the upcoming season.
The Senators moved on from their longtime goalie in Craig Anderson after he spent the past 10 seasons with the team. He went 11-17-2 in 2020 with a GAA of 3.25 and a save percentage of .902. He also failed to record a shutout for the first time in his Senators tenure. He is currently a free agent as well.
While Ron Hainsey didn’t make much of an impact on the offensive side of the puck (one goal and 11 assists), his defense can’t be denied as he blocked 102 shots.
One player that played on the Senators last season and signed a new contract is Mark Borowiecki. He registered 18 points with 120 blocks and 199 hits. He signed with the Nashville Predators on a two year deal worth $4 million.
Notable additions and signings
The Senators added quite a few pieces to their roster as they aim to take a step forward after being bottom feeders in the past couple seasons.
Their biggest addition is probably Matt Murray. They acquired him by trading a prospect and a second-round pick in the past draft. As he was a restricted free agent, they were quick to give him a new contract with a deal of $25 million over four years with him getting $1 million more each season starting at $4 million in 2021.
Last season with the Pittsburgh Penguins, he went 20-11-5 with a GAA of 2.87 and a save percentage of .899, a career low mark.
With Duclair and Pageau no longer on the roster, they needed help bolstering their top six which they went out and signed Evgenii Dadonov for three years and $15 million. With the Panthers last year, Dadonov tallied 47 points with 25 of those being goals with a career high shooting percentage of 15%.
They also added more depth up the middle by signing Alex Galcehnyuk to a cheap one year deal at just $1.5 million. He only played in 14 games with the Minnesota Wild in 2019-20 and struggled with the Penguins in the previous seasons but the Senators are hoping he can bounce back.
The Senators traded for two defenseman in Josh Brown and Erik Gudbranson. Brown costed the Senators a fourth round pick and they subsequently gave him a two year contract. The cost for Gudbranson was a fifth round pick in 2021.
The Senators also re-signed two of their players in former Maple Leaf Connor Brown to a three year extension and Chris Tierney to a two year deal.
How do the Senators compare to the Leafs?
The past few seasons have seen the two teams in the province of Ontario in opposite directions. The Leafs have been the superior team and near the top of the league while the Senators have been going through a lengthy rebuild being stuck in the bottom.
The Senators time in the bottom of the standings though is slowly coming to an end. Their recent additions of Murray and Dadonov are a step in the right direction as they look to accelerate their rebuild and move onto the next stage.
They have some intriguing prospects in Erik Brannstrom who was the centerpiece of the return they got from the Las Vegas Golden Knights for Mark Stone. While they haven’t had much success in drafting players over the past few years with the exception of Tkachuk, they did just have three first round picks in the past draft including two in the top five.
While their recent first round picks may not make an impact in year one, they sure will down the road assuming they pan out.
dark. Next. Leafs Top 10 Prospects (Updated)
While the Senators aren’t at the same level as the Toronto Maple Leafs are, they are slowly getting there and it’s time people start paying attention to them.