The Ottawa Senators are wasting little time addressing areas of need following their first-round playoff sweep at the hands of the Carolina Hurricanes. With the NHL Draft approaching on June 26-27, president of hockey operations and GM Steve Staios was active at last week’s Combine in Buffalo. According to Bruce Garrioch of The Ottawa Sun, Staios met with league executives and player agents amid a thin free-agent market that is pushing more clubs toward trades. The push includes additions at all areas of the roster.
A league executive indicated Ottawa is in the market for a top-six winger capable of lining up with Tim Stützle and captain Brady Tkachuk. While the Senators lack significant assets for a major splash, Garrioch’s sources noted Anaheim’s Mason McTavish as a realistic target given existing organizational ties. Jordan Kyrou was previously mentioned in early deadline chatter, though Garrioch noted that scenario “doesn’t make sense” for Ottawa at this stage.
On the blue line, adding a top-four right-shot defenseman remains a priority with veteran Nick Jensen expected to test unrestricted free agency following knee surgery. RFA Jordan Spence averaged 25 minutes of ice time during his four postseason games and holds arbitration rights, which could set up potentially tricky negotiations.
In an effort to boost the blue line and offer any veteran help, the Senators also checked in on St. Louis veterans Colton Parayko and Justin Faulk at the March trade deadline. However, neither was willing to waive their new move clauses to come to Ottawa. Faulk was ultimately dealt to Detroit, while Parayko declined to waive his no-move clause despite a strong offer from Buffalo that included a high-end prospect and first-round pick.
In net, the Senators are expected to focus on backup goaltending, and should qualify Leevi Meriläinen, while monitoring UFAs options like Connor Ingram and Stuart Skinner, among others.
Veteran UFA forwards Claude Giroux and Nick Cousins have noted strong desires to stay in Ottawa. Staios is reportedly high on retaining both, with Giroux likely returning on another bonus-heavy structure.
Trade talks will be a little more challenging without the draft capital of their No. 32 overall draft selection. Expect trade discussions to intensify in the coming weeks as clubs position themselves ahead of July 1 free agency.
It’s one thing to state hey I want to make some trades. Quite another to find a trade partner who not only agrees to what you want to trade but is willing to give up what you want. It just seems like making trades in the NHL is getting harder and harder to do with parity becoming closer to a reality. Pretty sure the Hawks have been finding that out for awhile. Sure taking on bad contracts for draft picks is easy especially with the Cap. But trying move them the other way as in Draft picks for NHL ready talent is proving rather difficult.
so this whole article is, sens need help up in top 6 up front, top 4 on backend and in goal, but dont have significant assets to trade in a depleted FA market.
sounds promising lol
Hertl will be available probably in Vegas . One of the biggest problems for Ottawa is that Canadian teams are high in players No Trades and free agents often do not relish going to Canadian teams. Especially smaller market teams that do not have much recent history of success. A player that should be not too pricy to acquire that is sort of fallen out of favour that still has oretty solid underlying numbers is Kovecevic in New Jersey. Would be a pretty solid 3RD option