• By: Dave Gross

Playoff Race Steams Ahead

Blue Monday, the most depressing day in the calendar year, just zipped past us. Longer days enjoyed with the sun and (potentially, hopefully) warmer temperatures are on the way.

And to further lighten the mood?

Playoff races. And this year’s shaping up to be more contentious than in recent memory.

Let’s dip into that and other pressing matters – particularly as it applies to Eastern Ontario’s Holy Trinity of Ottawa, Montreal and Toronto.

Onwards with some questions-of-the-week . . .

WHAT’S IN A NUMBER?

Well, let’s check it out – 53, 52, 52, 52, 51, 50, 50, 48, 47 and 45.

Working the math: That’s 10 Eastern Conference teams chasing down two wild-card positions and the final divisional posting with roughly 35 games remaining in the regular season. 

That also works out to a lot of Tums, Rolaids or Maalox. 

What a set-up and what a playoff race ahead. Exhausting even for the most casual of casual fans of Ottawa, Tampa, Montreal, Pittsburgh, Detroit, the Islanders, Rangers, Boston, Columbus and Philadelphia. The schedule is already a grind for these clubs. For instance – Ottawa. This week alone the Senators played, or will play, the Rangers and Boston (twice), and lest we forget that upcoming Toronto ‘home’ game Saturday night at the Canadian Tire Centre.

The great Harry Bosch (this is me encouraging you to read the Michael Connelly books) would put it this way: “Everybody counts, or nobody counts.” And here? It’s every game counts or count yourself out.

Good drama.

Relish it, this kind of chase doesn’t come often.

WHAT’S YOUR GOAL HERE?

To date myself (I mean, who else would? Rim-shot) with this culture-bomb reference from the late 1970s (bear with me): Ottawa scores less than Ralph Malph.

The Senators have had their own Happy Days this season as the team currently clings on to one of the two wild-card spots. There are concerns though. Concerns concerning scoring.

Ottawa ranks in the bottom tier of the league (25th) in goals-scored per game (2.79). As TSN’s Craig Button pointed out this week, it’s trials and tribulations making any kind of playoff run sporting that kind of number.

By comparison, Tampa leads the parade at 3.61 per game, followed by Washington with 3.55 then Winnipeg at 3.48. 

Ottawa’s also been goose-egged four times in the past 10 outings.

The reality is this – the team is awfully thin offensively once you roll past Tim Stutzle, Brady Tkachuk, Josh Norris, Claude Giroux and Drake Batherson. That’s the beginning of a nice top two lines but the drop-off afterwards is big.

Too big.

WHERE YOU AT, BRADY TKACHUK?

Goal-wise and points-wise, the 25-year-old is stagnant. 

Tkachuk is point-less in eight straight games.

If Tkachuk wasn’t doing what he usually does like positioning himself in the opposition goalie’s face or shooting when he has the chance, this would be troublesome. Fact is, the dry run is an anomaly cause he’s still doing what he does best.

He still leads the team in goals (18) and history tells us more will arrive sooner rather than later.

The supporting cast, including Ridly Greig (44 games, six goals), Shane Pinto (39, eight), Mike Amadio (37, two), Zack Ostapchuk (33, one), Jake Sanderson (47, two) and Thomas Chabot (46, three) need to do more.

ON THE OTHER HAND?

There’s the defensive play.

Man-oh-man does this team look a whole lot different than in previous lifetimes. Credit crusty Travis Green (does anyone do resting-bitch-face better?) for instilling an attentive and active approach to cleaning up the d-zone. Whatever system he’s employing, it’s working.

The Senators rank ninth in goals-against (2.79) and that’s without the services of Linus Ullmark for more than a month. With the unfortunate exception of Sanderson, who runs around willy-nilly too often, the Ottawa defence presents a calm front.

If there’s an early team MVP award, consider Nick Jensen.

MONTREAL: LA VIE EN ROSE?

The Habs and their faithful might be viewing the hockey world through rose-coloured glasses but the more we see of them, the more we’re buying into what they’ve been putting out there in recent weeks.

What a run.

Montreal is now tied with the Senators in the standings, and that’s something that looked laughable back in early December. Nobody’s chuckling now. The Canadiens are playing with enormous confidence and energy.

Quite simply this is the NHL’s most entertaining and delightful team to watch.

WELCOME TO THE NEW-AGE LEAFS?

This corner has seen its fill of Toronto Maple Leaf games this season and – before everyone hops on the clichéd ‘wait’ll the playoffs’ train – there’s definite change.

The one word that sticks out is maturity. The frolicking happy-go-lucky days of freewheeling Toronto are gone. 

The equally (to Travis Green) resting-bitch-face presence of Craig Berube has the Leafs playing playoff-style hockey . . . for the most part. There remains the odd (very odd, really) where Toronto looks like the Sheldon Keefe-Kyle Dubas era Buds. But you don’t see the reversion often.

And since we started earlier on the MVP chant, in Toronto most would point to the goaltending or Willy Nylander or Mitchell Marner.

To us?

It’s Chris Tanev. The veteran might have been awarded too much term in his free agent deal but he’s precisely what the Leafs needed. Toronto isn’t rebuilding towards some kind of future anytime soon. With the Eastern Conference as wide open as it is, the Leafs need to be (and are) all-in in 2025.

OTTAWA SENATORS WEEK AHEAD:

Thursday, Jan. 23: Ottawa at Boston (7 pm)

Saturday, Jan. 25: Toronto at Ottawa (7 pm)

Sunday, Jan. 24: Utah at Ottawa (5 pm)

thegrossgame@yahoo.com