Waiting game on for Senators before team’s inevitable shakeup
With ‘key changes’ promised, fate of coaches and players up in air,
This final week of the season is a waiting game for the Senators.
Meaning they’re all waiting to see what happens ... off the ice.
They will close out their home schedule at Canadian Tire Centre on Thursday night against the Florida Panthers, make a trip to the TD Garden in Beantown on Saturday afternoon to end the season and then the real action will begin off the ice as those “key changes” owner Eugene Melnyk talked about two weeks ago start to take place.
At this juncture, games like the home contest against the Pittsburgh Penguins on Tuesday night are really nothing more than a formality, and throughout the dressing room many of the players are wondering what’s going to happen next.
Though coach Dave Cameron’s chances of returning aren’t good at all, we’re told no final decision has been made. While former coach Cory Clouston was given his walking papers at the Ottawa airport only moments after the club touched down following a day game in Boston to conclude the schedule in 2011, that likely won’t be the case here.
General manager Bryan Murray, who is believed to be leaning toward returning in his role next season, told reporters last Friday in Philadelphia he was doing a full review of the organization before making any decisions. That means he’ll likely speak with the players, once the dust settles, to get their thoughts.
The players, for the most part, have been steadfast in their support of Cameron and maybe they’re the only ones who can throw him a lifeline.
Perhaps they’ll put in a good word or two for him in the postmortem. Enough to keep him on the job? Well, that’s the milliondollar question. The players insist they like their coach, he’s given them the tools to win and they should be the ones who are held accountable for what’s been a terrible season.
If the Senators decide to give Cameron his walking papers after 15 months on the job — and a year left on his contract — it would be the seventh coaching change since the club went to the Stanley Cup final in 2007. The players are well aware that this kind of move doesn’t reflect well on them, either.
“It’s tough for me being here,” winger Zack Smith told Postmedia before Tuesday’s visit by the Penguins. “This is my sixth year. I’ve seen a lot of coaches, and that’s not a good thing.
“As a player, you kind of take a little of that to heart, knowing that is not where it (needs) to be and it’s the coaches that sometimes take the fall for that. I think a lot of it lands on the shoulders of the players. We just have to be better.
“We know we have a great team here. We’ve just got to find a way to improve and get to the next level. Hopefully, that happens next year.”
That’s the biggest problem that Melnyk and Murray have with this team: It didn’t take the next step after a miraculous finish last season and they’re trying to come up with the answer as to why. While the Senators weren’t expected to be world-beaters, they felt they should be comfortably sitting in a playoff spot.
There is no question a lot of that falls on the shoulders of Cameron and his staff because it’s their job to get these players prepared nightly. The issues with this team are countless: no consistency, no clue defensively some nights, terrible special teams and odd decisions on the way personnel is employed.
The players don’t believe all of that should fall on the coach.
“We’re the ones out there playing the game. To deflect the blame anywhere else is kind of a cop-out,” Smith said. “It’s on us, for sure.”
If Cameron is back — and, let’s be honest, that’s a massive if — then at the very least changes to his coaching staff will be made. The Senators won’t stick with the status quo because missing the playoffs this spring wasn’t an option, despite injuries to key players such as Clarke MacArthur and Kyle Turris.
The players heard and read every word of Melnyk’s comments, and though they’ll smile for the camera at the team picture Wednesday, they have no illusions about the fact this will be one of their last get-togethers as a group.
“After our owner came out and said what he did, maybe you have to be prepared for some changes,” Smith said. “What that will be I have no idea. It’s not something we can control.
“Any time you don’t make the playoffs, or you’re not where you want to be as a team, then there’s something that needs to be changed.”
Changes off the ice. Changes on the ice. Two games and it’ll all be over.
Where the changes will start and stop is all a guessing game.
Once the final buzzer goes Saturday afternoon, the status of the Senators’ coaching staff and players becomes TBD (to be determined).