Today’s Sens news ahead of the season opener:
-Ottawa’s lineup for tonight against Detroit (link, which airs on Sportsnet), with Konpoka out due to bumps and bruises; The Team 1200 just reported that they believe Lee will play instead of Rundblad, but as it’s not definitive I’m leaving both options below:
Milan Michalek-Jason Spezza-Nikita Filatov
Colin Greening-Mika Zibanejad-Daniel Alfredsson
Nick Foligno-Stephane Da Costa-Chris Neil
Erik Condra-Zack Smith-Bobby Butler
Chris Phillips-Erik Karlsson
Jared Cowen-Sergei Gonchar
Filip Kuba-David Rundblad/Brian Lee
–The Ottawa Citizen‘s Allen Panzeri has a Q&A with Bryan Murray (link) which includes some interesting statements: “Milan Michalek looks like he has come into camp in great shape. If he can score 25 goals or thereabout, that would be a real bonus to our team. If Nikita Filatov could get 20, we would be incredibly happy, but I don’t know if we thought that he would be a goal scorer. I think he’s a playmaker. I think he’s a guy that creates offence by the way he skates and handles the puck. I don’t think at any time during his career, even when he was drafted by Columbus, that anyone thought he was going to be a high-end goal scorer.” I don’t recall hearing Filatov described as a playmaker before and I wonder if Murray is simply trying to adjust expectations away from goals. “There’s no question Brian Lee has to step up. He’s not going to be a point getter, so maybe he can be a shutdown guy with (Chris Phillips) or whoever Paul decides to put him with. But he has to be strong, be forceful, be a contributing player.” This is pretty straightforward to me–if Lee isn’t great defensively there’s no point in having him on the roster.
-Rob Brodie writes about the anticipation for the season opener (link) which includes some interesting comments. Chris Phillips said, “It seems like everyone’s on the same page. There’s not a lot of guys behind the scenes trying to figure out exactly what’s going on, or any confusion. It is a clear message about what they expect — a lot of skating and hard work. We’ll start from there and if we do that on a nightly basis, things are going to fall into place for us.” The implication (that last year there were a lot of guys behind the scenes trying to figure out what was going on) is stark. Jason Spezza added, “It’s probably the hardest camp that I’ve had in years. He’s got our skating legs under us and we’re looking forward to getting in some games and using our legs in a productive manner and not just in practice … The practices are the hard part and the games are the fun part. We’re looking forward to getting into games and reaping some of the benefits of what we’ve been doing in practice.”
–The Ottawa Citizen weighs in with their predictions for the Senators this year (link), which range from 12th-15th.
–The Silver Seven offers their predictions for the Sens (link), which range from 8th-14th.
-The Binghamton Senators roster has been set (link), with Josh Godfrey, Jack Downing, Mike Ratchuk, Mike Radja, and Corey Milan sent down to the ECHL (Joy’s link accidentally misses Max Gratchev making the team below, so I added him in).
29 — Mike McKenna
40 — Robin Lehner
2 — Eric Gryba
5 — Mark Borowiecki
6 — Craig Schira
9 — Bobby Raymond
17 — Patrick Wiercioch
38 — Tim Conboy
11 — Louie Caporusso
12 — Patrick Cannone
13 — Mark Parrish
16 — Kaspars Daugavins
19 — Jim O’Brien
20 — Andre Petersson
21 — Derek Grant
22 — David Dziurzynski
23 — Corey Cowick
27 — Mike Hoffman
36 — Wacey Hamilton
39 — Max Gratchev
44 — Francis Lessard
84 — Corey Locke
-The Binghamton opening lineup for tonight against Hershey (link), with Louie Caporusso and Max Gratchev as the scratches:
Mike Hoffman-Corey Locke-Mark Parrish
Jim O’Brien-Derek Grant-Kaspars Daugavins
Pat Cannone-David Dziurzynski-Andre Petersson
Corey Cowick-Wacey Hamilton-Francis Lessard
Mark Borowiecki-Tim Conboy
Eric Gryba-Patrick Wiercioch
Bobby Raymond-Craig Schira
-The Elmira Jackals released six players from their training camp roster (link), Alec Kirschner, Matt Moffat, Paul Arnott, Vinny Geonnetti, Clay Goodall, and Michael DiLorenzo.
–The Canadian Press included some amusing comments from Chris Nilan after Don Cherry‘s rant on Hockey Night in Canada, but this morning Sportsnet had removed them from the article so I had to go and find them elsewhere (City TV‘s site, link): “Let’s get it straight right here and now, I never said that players who were fighters were prone to alcoholism and drug abuse. I guess those who can’t play coach, or just had a show called coaches corner. pretty sad he has to say that to get ratings. Guess he see’s the writing on the wall with CBC losing market share to Bell and TSN.“
2 Comments
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eyeonthesens 
I don’t know why everyone keeps thinking Filatov is a sniper. Like most skilled players, he has a good shot, but all along he’s told us he’s a playmaker, the org has told us he’s a playmaker, CBJ fans have told us he’s a playmaker… why are we expecting a goal scorer?
Filatov being a sniper is not an uncommon opinion (eg, his Hockey Futures profile), but as long as he’s creating offence no one should care if it’s assists or goals.