The are many reasons for the rapid demise of the Ottawa Senators, including several blunders on the part of their general manager.
For Ottawa Senators general manager Bryan Murray, there must be days when he walks out of the latest Senators team meeting, closes his office door, sits back in his chair and wonders, "What the heck happened here?"
An Ottawa club that did everything the right way on the way to the top of the Eastern Conference has made blunder after blunder since reaching the 2007 Stanley Cup Final.
Now, their window has passed. They are just another team – one that appears very unlikely even to make the playoffs this season.
So, where did it all begin to fall apart?
Well, this much is for sure: when Murray pauses for that reflective moment in his office, there had better be a very large mirror on the wall, because the guy looking back at him is probably the best place to start.
Let us begin with the obvious: what kind of team rises from expansion fodder to that long-awaited appearance in the Stanley Cup, and then immediately fires the GM that got them there?
That’s what the Sens did to John Muckler, a move that had Murray’s finger prints all over it. There is no coincidence that Murray replaced Muckler as Sens GM.
Did Muckler make a mistake letting Zdeno Chara go and keeping Wade Redden? Sure he did. But he had done so many things right in Ottawa that his firing was the first sign that the Sens were a dysfunctional organization in many ways.
That dysfunction under Murray was made plainly clear when the next season was submarined by Senators goaltender Ray Emery, whose off-ice antics and poor play in net was too much for last year’s Sens to overcome.
It was Murray who was coaching the team when Emery was allowed to run by his own rules. It was Murray who, as a long-time hockey man, should have seen that "dressing room distraction" train coming down the tracks, and traded Emery as his first move as Sens GM, at a time when Emery’s value was at his highest.
Instead, Murray fired head coach John Paddock because Paddock couldn’t thrive in the polluted atmosphere that was the Sens dressing room. Murray couldn’t thrive as Paddock’s replacement, and now Craig Hartsburg can’t win with this team either.
Maybe it’s not the coach’s fault, after all?
Today, the Sens are a lock to post less wins than they had the year before for the fourth straight season. They are dead last in the East and tied for 29th place overall.
Since Jan. 1 the Sens have won just 24 of 62 games.
That’s .387 hockey from a team that was in the Stanley Cup just a year and a half ago.
Personnel-wise, Murray never has solved the critical issue that faces his team. To this day, Ottawa has two backup goaltenders in Alex Auld and Martin Gerber.
Still no No. 1.
Jason Spezza has, under Murray’s watch, been coddled to the point where – after nearly 350 NHL games – he is still unable to produce offensively while showing even a modicum of defensive responsibility.
He is an exceptional player who needs somebody to demand that he become a complete player, but like Emery, Spezza has been allowed to march to his own beat the whole way through his tenure in Ottawa.
And now, injury has been added to insult, with a couple of heart and soul guys going down in Mike Fisher and Chris Neil.
Fisher will miss at least two weeks with a strained ligament in his right knee. Neil needs surgery to repair a torn meniscus in his right knee.
"It definitely could have been a lot worse," added Fisher, who was fit enough to ride the bike Wednesday morning. "It feels better today and it won’t be anything that keeps me out of the lineup for too long."
"We have to wait until after the surgery to see what the timeline is, but I’ve been fortunate to heal pretty quick so far in my career," said Neil.
"You always hope for the best case scenario."
That’s what they do in Ottawa. They hope.
Hope that Emery would get his act together. Hope that Spezza will dig in.
Hope that their run two seasons ago does not mark the pinnacle for a franchise that, not so long ago, looked poised to have a dominant run atop the standings.
