The Ottawa Senators are Shocking Everyone...

The Ottawa Senators are surprising everyone so far early into the NHL season, and I have to say, while it's very impressive that they're overcoming a ton of injuries, more injuries than most teams have had to undergo so far, I think a lot of people were sleeping on this team from the beginning. To be honest, I understand some people being surprised. I'm not all that surprised about what Ottawa has done so far, especially when you think about what they were last year, right? You kind of got lost because the goaltending wasn't all that good, but this was a team that had one of the best analytics in the game. Even towards the end of the season, when they had major injuries to their defensive core, they were able to push into the playoffs. I think a lot of people focus a bit too much on what happened in the playoffs and not enough about the road and how they got there. For the record, while it wasn't a very impressive series, losing to the Stanley Cup champions is never something to hang your head on too much. But what really kind of caught my attention with the Ottawa Senators this year is the fact that they've been able to be so dominant to start the year despite injuries. Because taking a look at the Atlantic Division, Ottawa is well in the mix for first place here right now, tied with the Bruins. Both have a 5-2 record. And when you consider all the players they've missed, basically their best defenseman, Jake Sanderson, has played all of four, maybe five minutes in the season so far. And there is an update on him that we're going to get to in a bit. But when you factor this all in, I think Ottawa Senators fans should be feeling really good about this team. And look, the Atlantic Division is a great division. I never thought that people were down on the Senators because they were a bad team. I think it was more of a thing where, like, there's a bunch of good teams. You got to put one down the charts. I do think, though, that the Senators were the wrong choice. Because when you look at this team and all the options they have, it's just a very well-constructed roster. And we talked about goaltending last year being a weakness, as we'll get into in this video. I don't think that's the case. We do have to start here with the negative injury update. Two injury updates in this video. First one isn't so great. We learn now that William Eklund underwent a successful surgery to repair a torn ankle tendon and will miss the next 10 to 12 weeks. And looking at that injury when it happened, obviously with skates, it's really hard to tell what happened. This definitely isn't one of the better case scenarios, though. I guess the positive take out of this even though you're gonna be missing him for a large portion of time is basically you're getting him back in three months and assuming this team can stick with it and be in the playoff conversation be around where they are right now right in one of those divisional spots i think it's absolutely fine to lose William Ekblad you're getting him back that's the important thing this is a player you're gonna need down the stretch it's a shame he doesn't have more time to build chemistry with his teammates but i think that's the positive you take from that we also got another injury update this is the positive one it's on Jake Sanderson and Artem Zub uh they were both back with the main group in morning skate today and while Jake Sanderson will not be playing against the Islanders I have to imagine they probably want to give him some time to get reps to make sure right this is an injury that we knew wasn't all too serious but sometimes these things in the NHL they start not too serious and they linger so it's a good sign that he was on the ice also worth noting he wore a contact jersey so it's only a matter of time before he's back in the lineup probably just want to give him some time to make sure everything is fine there but Artem Zub will be in the lineup against the New York Islanders and this is a huge boost for this team right let's talk again about the Ottawa Senators and their record this is a team that's done that so far without two of their top four defensemen right this is a team that's dealt with a lot of injuries already this season not just in the fourth quarter you're missing a top six forward and two top defensemen and still you go 5-2-0 and it's very encouraging for the Ottawa Senators the team that i think a lot of people focus a bit too much on Brady Tkachuk and i understand um the the hate Brady Tkachuk not going as well now he had that huge game the other night against Columbus personally i'll still come out and say it at the time of the trade i felt like people were hating too much on Ottawa i don't think he's a good enough player to get that upset about right listen he provides a lot he's very physical he's strong but this is a guy who's a quality first line winger not one of the best in the league and you replace him with a player that i think is very solid in William Eklund now it is disappointing that William Eklund is going to miss time this is a similar thing that Ottawa dealt with last year though where they missed Brady Tkachuk for a significant amount of time they were able to overcome it i believe especially now this year they're going to be able to overcome this and once they do i'll be really interested to see how William Eklund continues to integrate this team i understand how half a point per game goal and assist didn't fully mesh yet was only playing 13 uh 14 minutes a game uh i do think when he comes back he's gonna get a bigger more comfortable role i've been a person i've always been very high on William Eklund as a player i think he's a very talented playmaker sometimes those guys they take a bit more time to mesh with the team but you look at his body of work in the past right last season 53 points for the Sharks a career high 58 i think this is a guy who can easily hit 65 plus points in the NHL and once he gets more ice time and earns it with the Ottawa centers i think this is gonna go really well actually i also do want to note with four games perhaps i'm looking too much in that time on ice per game probably got injured in that game so um scratch that when i was talking about that you know sometimes these numbers you got to understand the full picture here but i really like what ottawa did this summer and looking at this lineup i think this is a team that does have what it takes not just to survive uh these injuries and be a playoff team but be a real threat right and of course every team will be looking at some point to upgrade uh during the season right this is not gonna be the final version of the Senators but what we're getting a look at now especially tonight is a more complete look at that defense of course you have to wait until Sanderson comes in but once he's back and this is why I think Ottawa is such a good team right you have a really strong center core and Sutzel, Cousins, Pinto right you love those three centers and they're gonna be playing the majority of the game and then you have Shabbat you have Sanderson you have Zob and honestly Spence i think has been incredibly underrated it's gonna be really interesting to see what happens with Yakimchuk uh this season i think there have been really good moments I think there have been not so good moments if you ask me I think the good has outweighed the bad but with a team like the Senators you know uh if there's a couple misplays here he might find his way in and out of the lineup at some point ultimately though Senators fans, I'd love to know what you think on the prospect i'm still pretty high on him i think he's going to get significant time in the NHL this season. I think having Sanderson back will only help the Senators make sure they're able to play Yakimchuk and opportunities that best fit his skill set. What I love about Sanderson is you can play him all those tough minutes and it allows you to really ease the rest of the lineup. And when you consider you all such a pot, it's just such a good defensive core. And talking about the Brady to Chuck thing, I think one of the things with the Senators that needs to get talked about more is I think this forward core is underrated, right? You don't have the Claude Giroux, but you still have Drake Batherson. You still have Tim Stützle. Dylan Cousins, I think, is one of the more underrated centers in the game at this point. I didn't absolutely love the Burakovsky signing. I still think he's finding his way, but he's a quality forward to put around with all their pieces, right? Claude Giroux has shown that age has not caught him yet. Shane Pinto is off to another really hot start. And with Shane Pinto, my big question here is, can he sustain a bit more of this? We saw this last year where he started insanely hot. Last year was more like the goal side as opposed to the assist side, but then it cooled down. If he can kind of take that next step, I think that's a really good sign for this Ottawa Senators team. I definitely think he's worth that contract. You have a lot of solid pieces in this group, and this is a team where you look at all four lines, all four of them have some decent scoring threats. This isn't a team where you look at the fourth line and it's like, not so good there. It's a really talented group, which makes sense why they're able to play such good team defense and really choke teams out, which is something you have to do in the NHL season. One of the main criticisms I have with Florida is they play this really hard, nasty game, and that's great, but it leads to a lot of injuries. And I know it's ironic saying that talking about the Ottawa Senators, but I love that this team is just like the depth they have. And the final thing I want to talk about, and he deserves a shout out, especially since we talked about early in this video about how the goaltending was not great last year. So far, that has not been the case. Ullmark has been absolutely incredible. And I think he's been a big part of why the Senators have been able to overcome having injuries overall. To be honest, they haven't been this analytical beast of a team so far. But Ullmark has kind of made up for some of those mistakes, right? And now that Senators is coming back, I think they're going to get back to that really high play level. And if Ullmark can keep up any level of what he's done so far this season, a .948 save percentage in five games right he's been absolutely electric out there making big saves I think the Senators team is a legitimate threat like when Ullmark is at his best and I know there have been some issues with that but right now when he is at his best this is a player who can contend for the best and you put that behind a team that has some good offensive pieces in addition has one of the best and underrated defensive units in the entire NHL yeah I think this team you can beat any team on any given night the Ottawa Senators are an absolute wagon i don't think people are giving them enough credit in the off season right of course sometimes you get excited about like the big acquisitions really the teams that are so good that they don't have to make these huge changes i know they had to make the trade to trade straight out of need right i think they did that at the right time right and that's the other thing i do want to touch on on the Senators of course i focus too much right but yeah you trade that eighth overall pick for uh for William Eklund, you still have quite a few assets here to make following moves going into the deadline. This is a team that continues to be in the position where they are right now. But let me know what you think about the Ottawa Senators in the comments below. Are you believing this 5-2 start, or do you think they're going to kind of mellow out? I, personally, I'm really high on this team. They got off to absolutely the start they needed to despite dealing with injuries. And now that they're getting their defense back, I think they're going to go on cruise control for a bit here comfortably. in my opinion, a playoff team in what I think is one of the best divisions we've seen in a really long time.