“It’s close. It’s gonna be close right down to the end,” Spezza said. “That’s what they wanted when they came up with the three-point games.
About Wayne Scanlan
It has been my pleasure to carry a flag for the Citizen sports department for 25 years, and a privilege to write a column since 1991. As the NHL Senators took over our town, I shifted in the mid-1990s from a general sports columnist to a mostly hockey guy. Representing this newspaper and its chain I have covered men's and women's hockey at several Olympic Games. London was my 10th Olympic assignment, as part of the Postmedia team at the 2012 Summer Olympic Games in England.
Along the ride I have been fortunate to cover the Tour de France, twice, and numerous Stanley Cup playoffs and Grey Cup championships. The Senators will dictate further travel plans.
From afar, it was bizarre to see Pierre Gauthier’s Montreal Canadiens spin out of control this season. As a hockey general manager, control was Gauthier’s modus operandi. He was controlling to the enth degree. Here in Ottawa, media members still talk about the time Gauthier put them on a one-cookie limit after arena meals (in [...]
In less than two weeks, poolies will be gathering up their stats and sketching out wish lists for the annual spring diversion known as the Stanley Cup playoffs. They will be armed with information on goals and assists of individual players, using that as a guide to which teams and what players might stick around [...]
Senators fans can be forgiven a thought of “oh no, not again,” watching a starting goaltender get hurt on Saturday night. It’s a movie they’ve seen too many times. All things considered, it could have been worse. Ben Bishop’s “lower body” injury (groin suspected), suffered during the second period of Ottawa’s 8-4 victory over the [...]
The message was plain to see, on the ball cap worn by Senators owner Eugene Melnyk: Relax. The Senators are finding that easier to do today, after Saturday’s 8-4 rout of the stately Pittsburgh Penguins. Few among the Ottawa faithful expected this turn of events, so soon after the Senators dreadful loss in Montreal the [...]
Down the road, I wonder if fans of the Senators will continue to appreciate Eugene Melnyk’s conversion to frugality.
Nearing the end of a great climb, the temptation is to look back down to where you came from. The problem with this, aside from potential vertigo, is the realization of the time and effort expended to get here. The young Ottawa Senators — many of whom haven’t climbed this high into an NHL season [...]