Bryan Murray Extended

In my earlier article today, I neglected to mention that Bryan Murray had his contract extended after the Ottawa Senators organization picked up his option for another season. There's no question that Murray deserved it after he has given the organization some stability in the wake of the John Muckler era or as the Gatinese Senators fans like to call it, l'ère de la merde.

More Volchenkov News

Remember that scene from the Fresh Prince of Bel Air when Hilary Banks' news anchor boyfriend Trevor proposed to her while bungee jumping and ultimately fell to his death? That's sort of how I felt when I read the following paragraph...

The team also said it has made a new contract offer to rugged defenceman Anton Volchenkov, one of its top blueliners. Murray said Volchenkov's New York-based agent Jay Grossman wants to present the offer before making a decision. ~ Ottawa Sun

It started off so well...and then I learned that Jay Grossman wants to present the offer to Volchenkov face-to-face in a meeting? Great. Now I'm concerned. Grossman, if you'll recall, is the same representative who helped facilitate the trade of Kovalchuk to the Devils after his client turned down numerous fair offers to keep the player in Atlanta. Obviously the circumstances are a bit different here in Ottawa than they are in Atlanta -- ownership stability, competitive team -- but I still have reservations that Volchenkov may ultimately decide to leave the organization via free agency thereby preventing the team getting anything in return.

Shutdown Line For the Playoffs?

Much has been made of last night's performance by Anton Volchenkov in helping to shut down Alex Ovechkin's line but he wasn't alone. The trio up front of Kelly, Fisher and Alfredsson deserves some credit and it should be interesting moving forward to see if these three will be called upon to match up against other teams' top lines.

Cheechoo Reactions From Around the Web...

Ottawa is no longer the greatest city in the history of ever. It's now to be known as the capital of Assholetown. ~ Cheechoo song guy

Jonathan Cheechoo will not accompany the Senators on their two game trip. He is finished in Ottawa. ~ @SunGarrioch

Hate this move. I understand the money side of things but this one hurts. Doubt anyone claims him. Bingo his next stop? ~ SensChirp

It finally happened: Jonathan Cheechoo has been put on waivers. This is likely necessary to make the cap hit work for Saturday's game, and it's kind of surprising it hasn't happened sooner. I highly doubt anyone will pick up Cheech, but you never know. ~ Darren M., Silver Seven Sens

I respect the hell out of Cheechoo, and would be the first in line to support him in regaining his NHL form, but business is business, and if you want to cash big cheques, you can’t blame the one writing them for expecting you to earn it too. ~ Gerald Norton, SenSay

Cheech should just walk away and save his legacy..."You're only as good as you're last performance!" ~ Canucnik

Volchenkov Contract News

According to Chris Botta, Senators announce they are not trading Anton Volchenkov, have made an offer to the potential UFA and want to keep him.

You know it's a good night when both of the Senators' special team units operate at 100-percent efficiency. Anyways, since it has become the norm, here's tonight's post-game haiku...

Picard on for three.
Hey Elliott! Watch glove side!
First in Northeast. Phew!

Mr. Glass

Enough is enough. Pascal Leclaire has joined the likes of Magnus Arvedson, Martin Havlat, Sami Salo and the pre-2001-02 Daniel Alfredsson as Senator players who cannot avoid injury. What once was empathy for these players has transcended into comedy. Maybe laughter is a popular coping mechanism, but what else is left to do when one finds out that Pascal Leclaire tripped over a puck at practice this morning and tweaked his knee? According to Bruce Garrioch, Leclaire spent several minutes stretching out his right knee and later appeared to be fine.

Call it a scare, just don't call it a surprise. It's a bigger revelation that he came out of today's freak accident in good health.

Senators At the Trade Deadline

"There's no chance of acquiring a player that makes any amount of money, so (the media) can have a break on that day - you won't have to worry about calling my office."

"Maybe somebody will call me and I don't know what they offer me, who knows? At this point in time I'm not anticipating very much." ~ Bryan Murray, National Post

An interesting quote. A little surprising though, I was expecting something more along the lines of if there's a move to be made at the deadline that makes us better without jeopardizing the future, I will pull the trigger. Even though this Murray quote was taken from the last week of January, I question whether or not there should be some concern that one or both of Chris Kelly and Jonathan Cheechoo are now playing on the team's top two lines.

Anyways, tomorrow brings the overhyped Olympic roster freeze deadline. Try to enjoy it.

Video of the Day

Thanks to a reader named Jamie P. for sending me this video featuring Gord Miller ripping into Pierre McGuire for his celebrity drivel during tonight's broadcast.

No Podcast This Week & New Comment System

Due to some extenuating circumstances, Tim and I will not be able to record a podcast for you readers this week. We apologize for the inconvenience and we will be back with one next week.

In regards to the new comment system, to leave quotes, you can do one of the following things:

• If you have a Twitter account, you can use that to log in and leave messages. These messages would have the ability to be posted in the comment thread here and on your actual Twitter account. (Ed. note: Unless you click the box that disables that option when you leave your message.) I think this format is a mutually beneficial arrangement that will not only promote this website, but will also help promote your Twitter account.
  
• If you play Yahoo! fantasy sports, you can use your Yahoo! login to sign in and leave comments.
  
• If you have a Facebook account, you can log in and post messages using that login.
  
• If you don't want to register for the website, you can still leave comments as a Guest. All that is needed is an email address to do it, but you can use a bogus email address to leave a response and protect your anonymity.

1. After watching That's Hockey prior to the start of last night's game I'm convinced that after last week's trades, Calgary's locker room is now in remission. Cory Sarich was interviewed and I think I heard him reference the team concept about thirteen times over the course of a minute.
   


2. The Ottawa media let us know that John Stevenson was in town yesterday helping out Brian Elliott and Pascal Leclaire for the first time. What they neglected to tell fans was that his goatee/bowl cut hair combo made him look like a decrepit Murray Hewitt from Flight of the Conchords. Poor guy. Someone should let him know that just because he's used to wearing a goalie mask doesn't mean that should prohibit him from looking professional at the workplace. I almost wish they'd officially hire the guy so that he could afford a haircut at First Choice.
   


3. We need a Michalek's Anonymous drinking game. One shot for every time that Milan inexplicably falls down on his own.
   


4. During the first period intermission, Hockey Central's panel discussed potential replacements for Ryan Getzlaf and John Shannon brought up Jason Spezza as a viable option. I'm sorry, I realize that Shannon is likely playing up to his audience but Spezza deserves Olympic consideration about as much as I deserve to have a Sens Chirp reader mention that I think Lecavalier to the Senators is going to happen.
   


5. Put the defibrullator down, Jonathan Cheechoo's career has a pulse!
   


6. Sportsnet plugged Alexei Kovalev's stickhandling ability and used footage from Sunday's Sens Skills Competition to illustrate the point that he's really, really good at it. Garry Galley let us know that Kovy has obviously spent a lot of time at practices manipulating the puck. Earth shattering material. I think it's safe to wager that when Galley mentioned that, someone in the Ottawa valley screamed at the television, "He should be devoting that kind of dedication to the defensive aspect of the game!"
   


7. Who was reffing last night's game? Stephane Auger? (Ed. note: I just checked NHL.com . It actually was Auger.) How did every official on the ice miss the hit from behind that Matt Stajan laid on Chris Kelly? The play eventually was whistled dead as Mike Fisher looked for retribution and took some liberties on Niklas Hagman. Jarome Iginla came to Hagman's defense and we were THIS close to seeing Fisher and Iginla drop the mitts. Unfortunately, Chris Phillips behaved like Matt Bradley and ruined what otherwise could have been something very special.
   


8. What was Chris Phillips thinking? Not only did his actions deprive us of a potentially epic tilt between Fisher and Iginla, it kept Iggy off of the ice for five minutes in a close hockey game. As much as I like having Fisher out there, with the way that Iggy's line was killing the Senators all night, that's a trade off that has to be made. (Ed. note: It was a piss poor performance by Phillips last night. His turnover at the Flames blueline in the first lead to the first Calgary goal and he eventually wound up as a -2 on the evening. Seeing Iginla dump him on his ass after he stepped in was just the icing on the cake.)
   


9. Attn: Chris Kelly. They're not vegetables. Finish your checks.
   


10. Cory Clouston made a number of moves in the second period to shake up the scoring and it seemed to lift the Senators a bit. While a lot will be made of the top two lines in last night's game, I was impressed with how easily Jesse Winchester assumed Chris Kelly's role on a line with Ruutu and Neil. Winchester's forechecking resulted in a Jay Bouwmeester turnover that lead to Ruutu's goal in the second period.
    


11. Getting back to John Stevenson for a second. I would like to use this opportunity to thank the Ottawa mainstream media for not ruining the surprise that is Stevenson's hair. It made Sportsnet's videoclip of the morning practice that much better.
    


12. I Tweeted that Fish vs Iggy had a chance to be like Harrelson vs Snipes in the movie White Men Can't Jump. Like Harrelson, it's uncanny how often Fisher takes advantage of the opposition because of their oversights. Again, I can't reiterate enough how awesome this fight could have been.
    


13. I            type                       like                Chris              Kelly                                        reads            cue              cards                        for      commercials.
    


14. Jonathan Cheechoo first line winger. That's going to take some time to get used to. However, if last night is any indication for how Cheechoo can play down the stretch as the team prepares for the playoffs, then I expect to read less Don Brennan comments opining for Shean Donovan to be reinserted back into the lineup. Seriously though, if Cheechoo can emerge as a viable option off of the bench, Cory Clouston's trust and willingness to roll four lines will put the Senators in an enviable position that can create some matchup problems for their opponents in the playoffs.
    


15. Not only did Brian Elliott win in an impressive fashion following Saturday's loss to the Leafs, he also recorded a milestone with his first 20 win season and was named the game's second star. Cory Clouston may not want to label Brian Elliott with a number, but I'm ready to cheer him on like I'm a Japanese fan at a Cheap Trick concert.
    

Thanks to Google News, I learned something new today. According to a website that calls itself the Thaindian News, Tenley Molzahn, one of the contestants on The Bachelor: On the Wings of Love may have in fact once been a girlfriend of Chris Campoli. For those keeping track at home, Molzahn ranks somewhere between Carol Alt and Sophie from Rockland on the list of women who've had relations with Senators hockey players. (Ed. note: Never trust the Thaindian News. Apparently, they've confused the information concerning Molzahn and another contestant, Gia Allemand, who actually dated Campoli. Hat tip to Twitter follower msconduct for the clarification and here are some pictures of Gia Allemand.)

I emailed my girlfriend to weigh in on this pseudo-celebrity and here's what she said,

Gia is a New Yorker, so I'm not surprised...Campoli? From the Sens? She kept saying how she has had her heart broken too many times, etc....she's only 26.

She may only be 26 but she has had the inopportune fortune of having two professional athlete relationships -- Campoli and Carl Pavano -- not work out. I think it may be safe to say that the gravy train has left the station.

Jonathan Cheechoo Goes For 500

Thanks to The Ottawa Sun's Don Brennan, I now know a few trivial statistics about Jonathan Cheechoo.

For one, Cheechoo is tied with Daniel Alfredsson for fifth amongst Ottawa's forwards with a Jason Blake'esque 111 shots on goal.

Secondly, Cheechoo hit four of the five styrofoam targets at Sunday's Sens skills competition. What we didn't know is that he earned $750,000 for each target hit. What? You thought that ownership was paying him for production in an actual game? Get real.

Also, Cheechoo will be suiting up for his 500th career NHL game tonight. While I was a bit surprised that Cheechoo had been around the League that long, I was even more surprised to learn that Cheechoo's name was included in trade rumo(u)rs involving the Los Angeles Kings.

According to Matthew Barry of Hockeybuzz, Cheechoo is being targetting by the Los Angeles Kings because Dean Lombardi thinks that Cheechoo can rekindle the success that he once had in San Jose. Cheechoo, you'll remember was a draft pick of Lombardi, the former Sharks GM. If you're now cleaning the coffee that you just spat out onto your computer monitor, brace yourself, it gets better. Allegedly the rumo(u)red return for Cheechoo is Oscar Moller and an undisclosed defenceman...

...Shit, that's almost more than Bryan Murray got for Heatley.

Elliott to Start

As per Ian Mendes' Twitter, Brian Elliott will get the start in nets tonight against the Flames. Elliott will get an opportunity to redeem himself after his personal best nine-game winning streak came to an end against the Toronto Maple Leafs this past Saturday.

“You can call it whatever you want, you can put whatever number you want on it. He’s starting tonight. I’m not going to label anything right now." ~ Cory Clouston

And with that, Cory Clouston dropped trou, took a steaming dump at the feet of the media scrum and said, "Here's your number two."

Elliotte Friedman's Senators Related Quick Hits...

If you haven't done so already, I highly recommend subscribing to Elliotte Friedman's blog. His 30 Thoughts articles provide some good information that's not easily found on the Interwebs. Anyways, for the purposes of this site, I purged these Senators related bits directly from his most recent work...

• Do not be surprised if former Senators president Roy Mlakar ends up running the Lightning for Jeff Vinik.
• Despite Saturday’s sleepwalk in Toronto, those Senators who were around for the Eastern Conference championship in 2007 believe this team is better than that one. Why? Deeper, more physical, more ways to beat you. Also, "Back then, we got nervous in close, low-scoring games,” said Chris Kelly. "That doesn’t happen anymore."
• Mike Fisher pointed out one thing the 2007 team did well, though: "We got hot at just the right time." This team will need that, too, especially with Washington, Pittsburgh and the Kovalchuk-ed Devils.
• Thought the referees working Saturday’s Toronto/Ottawa game did a great thing by sending Matt Carkner to the dressing room after Colton Orr kayoed him. If he convulses in the penalty box, it’s horrifying.
• Erik Karlsson will be back right after the Olympics, and he’s beginning to show his offensive gifts. Karlsson’s a confident guy. One day, the Senators were practising a 5-on-3. "After it was over, he came over and said to me, 'Why didn’t you do it this way instead?'" said a laughing Daniel Alfredsson.
• The deal with Marek Svatos: He wants out of Colorado. They want him out. He’s a UFA, so he will be highly motivated and relatively cheap. Svatos played for Cory Clouston in junior. I think he wants a reunion.

Yesterday was supposed to be a good day. I woke up knowing that the Senators were looking to extend their eleven game win streak in Toronto, home of the 29th ranked team in the NHL that had just dealt away 40-percent of its offence earlier in the week. On paper, it looked like an easy win and ultimately, it's what lead to me submitting my 3-2 victory prediction for Ottawa in time for James Gordon's Friday night prediction panel deadline. Little did I know that the events leading up to the game would spiral out of control and stack the deck unfavorably against the Senators.

The first sign that things were going to wrong occurred as I was doing my morning errands and was driving behind an Aztek with novelty license plate that read SENSRULE. Whether there's some mysterious correlation between the two is completely subjective. However, this is second time that this has happened within the past season, so I'll be damned if there isn't something more to this coincidence.

When I arrived home after running my errands, the first thing that I did was to sit down with my laptop and peruse the interwebs to keep up with the latest hockey news. It didn't take very long to find out that Brian Burke's son was tragically killed in a fatal car accident on Friday night and that JS Giguere would be starting in nets for the Leafs. So not only would the Leafs have the sentimental karma working in their favour, they were starting the guy who absolutely killed us in the '07 Cup Finals. Not only is Giguere equipped like the Michelin man, he's the latest in a lineup of goalies who have killed the Senators over the years. (Ie. Tim Thomas, Ed Belfour, Curtis Joseph, Martin Gerber, et al.) And to make matters worse, he was acquired earlier in the week and was stuck in that proving himself to his new team and teammates mode.

Naturally, as I surfed the 'Net, I also sifted through my email wherein I found this message in my inbox...

Morning gents...if you were wondering why your picks aren’t posted yet after I asked for them by 10 pm yesterday, it’s because my laptop is fried. Apparently I have what’s called the “Blue Screen of Death,” which sounds pretty bad.

Anyways, I’m at the office posting stuff now. ~ James Gordon

The Blue Screen of Death?! How could things get any worse?

Three words...Bob. Fucking. Cole.

As the Montreal Canadiens played earlier in the afternoon and the CBC didn't schedule the senile wonder to do the play-by-play, hockey fans quickly deduced that Bob Cole would be calling the Leafs versus Senators game later that evening. In other words, Senators fans would have to soul search for a reason not to stab themselves in the ears since Cole is notorious for his disregard in using the correct Senators player names while he calls the action.

There you have it: A novelty license plate; the sentimental aspect of the Leafs winning one for Burkie; the Blue Screen of Death; JS Giguere; and Bob.Fucking.Cole. Last night's outcome was determined before the puck was even dropped and the referees were allowed to affect the outcome of last night's game. So when I get emails from Leafs fans claiming to be Ron Wilson that say,

Good prediction. Let me guess, you're still holding Nortel stock... or worse yet ... Senators season tickets!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

LOSER!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

oh, yeah

5-0 flattered the Sens

we're getting tired of owning you...

I'm compelled to say that he's right. This Leafs fan deserves to be one smug prick. Not only did his team's chance at the postseason increase from 0.0% to 0.1% after last night's win, he's correct in asserting that I shouldn't have bet against the Leafs.

So yes, go ahead and revel in yesterday's trivial win over a team that had lost the game before it had even started. (Ed. note: Like Ian Mendes mentioned in yesterday's prediction panel, it's unbelievable how often the Leafs hold meaningless things over Senators fans. Four playoff series wins? Fantastic. Congratulations on floundering out in each of the subsequent playoff series.) Unfortunately because of emails like this, I'll have to comfort myself in the fact that the likelihood of Ottawa making a postseason appearance is now at 97.8%.

After several months of negotiations toward a long-term contract with forward Ilya Kovalchuk and his agent, we were unable to reach an agreement and elected to trade Kovalchuk and defenseman Anssi Salmela to the New Jersey Devils in exchange for Johnny Oduya, Niclas Bergfors, Patrice Cormier and a first round draft pick in 2010.

We want you, our fans, to know that throughout the negotiation process, the Thrashers organization remained committed to offering Ilya a contract that exceeded those of the league’s best and highest paid players, and was commensurate to his skill level and performance history.

To that end, we offered Kovy several lucrative packages in an effort to meet his financial objectives. One offer that we extended to Ilya would have made him the highest paid NHL player on a per year average with $10 million per year for seven years. Another offer totaled $101 million over 12 years, and it, combined with the previous contractual commitments that were made to Kovy, would have earned him more money than any other NHL player in the history of the league.

If we had met Kovy’s ultimate demand, we would have jeopardized our ability to build a competitive team around him and retain our other young players as they became eligible for new contracts in the seasons ahead. At the end of the day, we couldn’t close that gap and simply reached a point at which we couldn’t reasonably go any higher.

We’re excited about the addition of all three players and feel that Johnny and Niclas will quickly complement our team of budding young stars, highly-skilled veterans and elite players. We also look forward to having Patrice join us in the near future. Our goals for this season have not changed—to make and advance as deep as possible in the 2010 Stanley Cup Playoffs—and we move ahead with a new sense of purpose that is energized by our continued climb in the standings as we position ourselves to compete with the best in the NHL.

We will maintain the option of bringing in more players, in addition to the ones that we have acquired in the trade, to make sure that we are fully competitive for the remainder of the season and the postseason.

We thank Ilya and Anssi for all they have done for our organization and wish them well. And we thank you, for your continued support, and look forward to your enthusiastic presence in Blueland to help drive us into the 2010 Stanley Cup Playoffs.

Don Waddell
Executive Vice President and General Manager
Atlanta Thrashers

Editor's note: Should these bolded paragraphs scare Senators fans at all? Jay Grossman is the player representation for both Kovalchuk and Anton Volchenkov. Is it reasonable to assume that Volchenkov may want to test the open market?