Duchene is heating up for the Senators, but it’s too late this season
Former Avs centre was hoping to go to a contender, but playoffs seem out of reach
This was supposed to be a big game. A first taste of the rivalry that Matt Duchene had grown up watching and dreaming about being a part of.
On the surface, it turned out to be just that.
“It was great,” the Ottawa Senators forward said of playing the Toronto Maple Leafs. “I remember the early-2000s playoff series with (Daniel) Alfredsson and (Mats) Sundin. I was always cheering for the Sens, to be honest. I wasn’t a Leafs fan growing up, so it’s cool to be a part of it and on this side of it.”
Had it been the first NHL game that you had watched this season — and had you not stolen a glance at the standings — Ottawa’s 4-3 win against Toronto on Wednesday would have seemed like it mattered. It was physical, with Nazem Kadri and goalie Craig Anderson jousting at each other with their sticks. It was fastpaced and frenzied, with the Leafs coming back twice after going down 2-0 and 3-2. And it came right down to the wire.
Duchene, who had two assists, took advantage of a bad pinch by Morgan Rielly and set up the winning goal with 3:05 remaining in the third on a slick pass to Tom Pyatt. But it was his play without the puck that sealed the win.
With Ottawa protecting a onegoal lead and the Leafs pressing for the equalizer with their goalie pulled, Toronto’s Mitch Marner had the puck just inside Ottawa’s blue line. That’s when Duchene uncharacteristically checked him across the line, putting the Leafs offside. Game over.
“I’m not a guy that’s a real physical guy without the puck,” Duchene said of the hit, which might have been a cross-check. “But it doesn’t matter who you are, you have to make a play like that. The guys let me know about it. That comes with the territory in that part of the game.”
Of course, it was all a mirage. While the win temporarily lifted the spirits of a team that the Blackhawks had embarrassed 8-2 the night before, it was mostly meaningless.
The Senators, who have won nine of 28 games since acquiring Duchene from the Colorado Avalanche in November, are still stuck in second-last in the Eastern Conference standings. The season is only half over, but their year might as well be done.
All that’s left is deciding which rental players will be shipped at the upcoming trade deadline and what odds Ottawa will have to select consensus No. 1 overall pick Rasmus Dahlin (as of Thursday, the fifth-worst team in the NHL had an 8.5 per cent chance at winning the draft lottery).
It’s not just the Senators who have nothing to play for. While there is parity — or mediocrity — in the NHL, there are also some really, really bad teams for whom the next three months are going to be an exercise in enduring the inevitable.
Over in the West, there is a nine-point gap or more between the bottom three teams (Edmonton, Vancouver and Arizona) and a playoff spot. In the East, it’s a bit more complicated, but not necessarily any more optimistic.
It’s hard to totally write off the 12th-place Panthers or 13thplace Red Wings, who are five and six points back of the final wild card spot, because they have two and three games in hand, respectively. The bottom three teams in the East (Montreal, Ottawa and Buffalo) are seven or more games back.
One thing is for certain: the Atlantic Division is all but sewn up.
No one is catching the Tampa Bay Lightning, who have a 12-point lead on the Boston Bruins and Toronto Maple Leafs. And no one else is catching the Bruins or Leafs, who might as well start booking hotels for the first round of the playoffs now. With an 11-point lead on the next-best team from the division, all that is to be decided is which team will have home advantage.
For Duchene, this has to be tough.
The 26-year-old forced a trade out of Colorado because he was tired of playing for a team that was continually spinning its wheels and wanted to be on a contender. Instead, he finds himself in familiar territory.
Upon his arrival, Ottawa has gone from being a Cup contender to reportedly asking Erik Karlsson if he’ll waive his no-trade clause. At the same time, the Avalanche, who are three points out of a playoff spot with three games in hand, have been one of the pleasant surprises of the season thanks to Nathan MacKinnon ranking second in league scoring.
To Duchene’s credit, he is trying to be part of the solution. Though he began his stint in Ottawa with only two goals and four assists in his first 21 games, he has scored four goals and seven points in his past seven games. The Senators are 4-2-1 during that span.
“A few go in, you start to feel good and get more confidence,” said Duchene. “And (when it’s not), you feel like you’re spinning in the mud and it’s frustrating, especially when you have games where you’re creating a lot of offence and it’s not going in. I had a lot of those probably in the first 15, 20 games here. It just didn’t go in and now it is and now it’s about maintaining it.”
It’s the kind of production the team had expected when acquiring him. Of course, it might have come two months too late.