SENS SAY NO TANKS TO BOTTOMING OUT
Players are thinking about winning culture, not the draft lottery, Borowiecki says
The Ottawa Senators are well aware some fans get frustrated every time the Senators pick up two points as the season winds down because they’re part of “TankNation.”
As the Senators prepared to face the Dallas Stars at Canadian Tire Centre on Friday night after back-to-back wins in Florida, they wanted want no part of any discussion about losing down the stretch just so the organization could get a better pick in the NHL draft in June.
Not only have the Senators moved two points ahead of the Vancouver Canucks for 28th place overall, but they also have two games in hand. Going into Thursday’s games, Ottawa was also just three points behind the Montreal Canadiens for 26th.
The Senators’ tragic number for official elimination from the playoffs is eight points and the closer they finish to the bottom, the better their odds of getting the No. 1 pick in the draft lottery, which has been tentatively scheduled for April 28 in Toronto.
“It’s a tough one. I get it. They’re fans of the organization and they’re thinking organization first,” Senators defenceman Mark Borowiecki said following a spirited 50-minute skate Thursday. “We’re all competitors, we all draw a paycheque here. I’m not going to come in here and roll over.
“I’m not going to come in here and mail it in (during) practice and mail it in (during) games. It’s not the way I’m wired, not the way I was brought up and I hold myself to the standard I hold myself to and everyone else in here would agree.
“Whatever happens, happens, but we’re all going to come in here and try.”
Ottawa isn’t the only NHL locale where this conversation is taking place. Fans of the Canucks, Canadiens, Arizona Coyotes, Buffalo Sabres and Detroit Red Wings are having it, too.
The Senators served notice before the trade deadline that their roster would undergo a rebuild. Whether it’s a full rebuild depends a lot on the future of captain Erik Karlsson, but owner Eugene Melnyk and general manager Pierre Dorion appear willing to take a step back in order to take a bigger step forward in the future.
Of course, the top pick in this year’s draft would be a key building block for the future, especially if the Senators could get Swedish defenceman Rasmus Dahlin, the top-ranked prospect for the 2018 draft.
“I don’t really pay attention to that,” Borowiecki said. “There’s a reason there’s a lottery in place and that’s so you don’t just pack it in and guarantee yourself the first pick.
“To think that you’re just going to go out there and lose and be better for it … First of all, as a group of athletes in here, as soon as that culture of losing creeps into your locker-room and as soon as that expectation of losing creeps in, that’s really, really hard to get rid of.
“I know culture isn’t a cool word with people who like numbers. If you’ve never played on a pro hockey team or played professional sports, you have to understand that there is a culture in this locker-room and we want it to be of winning, accountability and work ethic, not mailing it in and just rolling over.”
Really, the Senators have recently been playing the way they expected to perform all season. It’s too little too late, but as head coach Guy Boucher noted, they’re trying to find out who will fit where next season and these late-season games will be a factor in those decisions.
“From (the trade deadline) on, you’re here and you want to stay here,” Boucher said. “That’s what the players are showing. There’s a lot of guys in that room that want jobs and they want to stay. Even some guys with contracts, whose names came up, they want to make sure that their names don’t come up anymore.
“We’ve got to know where we’re going and that’s why all these games are so important … There’s a lot of people not looking at the same things we’re looking at and it’s normal because they’re looking at the draft. Inside, we’ve got to make some decisions here and we’ve got to know what we want and what kind of culture we want to grow here.
“The guys have got to fit the culture.”
We’re all competitors, we all draw a paycheque here. I’m not going to come in here and roll over.