Better luck next year: At least the Ottawa Senators gave us some dumb arguments
This team made empty-net goals more relevant than they ever should have been.
Welcome back to Better Luck Next Year, a series that will focus on each team as they get eliminated from Stanley Cup Playoff contention and the Stanley Cup Playoffs. What went wrong, why it went wrong, what (if anything) went right, and what is next. We continue today with the next team to be officially eliminated from Stanley Cup Playoff contention: The Ottawa Senators.
If you can not be a good team, you should at least be an interesting team.
To some extent, the Senators were at least occasionally interesting this season, even if it was for the dumbest possible reason imaginable.
This is the team made empty-net goals — or attempted empty-net goals — into a thing. A stupid thing. But definitely a thing.
One of the biggest highlights of the season for the Senators probably came back in February when Ridly Greig wrapped up a 5-3 win by blasting a slap shot into an empty Toronto net, causing Maple Leafs defenseman Morgan Rielly to lose his mind and cross-check Greig in the head, sparking an end of game brawl.
Rielly was suspended, the Maple Leafs kind of defended his actions and a bunch of old school NHL people praised him for standing up for his teammate or some other nonsense.
More rational people said, “come on, man. This is dumb.”
The whole thing was, in my mind, objectively funny. Greig knew exactly what he was doing when he uncorked that slap shot against a rival — he was trying to make them mad, let’s be honest here — but that still doesn’t justify Rielly’s lizard brain reaction. Honestly, he probably got off light with the five-game suspension he ended up getting.
But what made the whole thing even more absurd came this past week when the Senators somehow found themselves on the other side of the empty-net code!
Just as time expired in the Senators’ loss to the New Jersey Devils, Nico Hischier casually allowed the puck to slide into the empty-net as he skated back to celebrate with his teammates. He did not shoot it in. He did not wind up and take a slap shot. He did not even really do anything except let the puck glide on the ice. This prompted the Senators’ prominent cage-rattler to lose his mind and start a post-game brawl.
I mean, yeah, he definitely let the puck go into the net on purpose. But again, who cares? It is not like this changed the outcome or made Ottawa lose by another goal. It literally meant nothing.
This, also, was objectively funny to me, simply because of the same team being involved in both sides of this stupid thing. How does that even happen? However it happens, this — THIS! — was probably the thing the Senators were most known for in 2023-24 as their playoff drought reached a seventh consecutive season.
The things that ended up sinking them were not unexpected.
Everything that went wrong
Keep reading with a 7-day free trial
Subscribe to Adam's Sports Stuff to keep reading this post and get 7 days of free access to the full post archives.