Step Away From the Ledge...

As is typical for Ottawa during playoff time, the Senators are out a few rounds too early and the public and media are salivating for a suitable virgin to sacrifice into the nearest volcano.

Hopefully cooler heads will prevail and rash acts will be avoided. When evaluating the result of this series, consider:

1. Buffalo is a good team.

The "David and Goliath" characterizations that typically accompany any Ottawa playoff series do not apply here. Buffalo managed to accumulate the same number of wins in the regular season, and were only 3 points shy of taking the division and conference titles away from the Sens. Considering that they had their #1 goalie in net, and that he was largely on form, it's not particularly surprising that two teams with relatively similar results, a similar style of play and similar amount of depth had a close series featuring 5 one-goal games and 3 OT wins.

2. There's plenty of blame to go around.

Ottawa's professional and amateur pundits spend hour after hour on the radio call-in shows debating who the culprit/scapegoat for this debacle is. The general impression around here is that there is some kind of key piece to the puzzle that one can withdraw in Jenga-like fashion in order to suddenly transform Ottawa into a Stanley Cup champion. That is simplistic, irrational and unrealistic.

Consider:

• Emery let in 7 goals in the opening game of this series. Has any Ottawa goalie EVER allowed that many goals in a game? Put another way, how many goalies manage to lose a game where his team manages to score 6? I guess he has to go.
• Alfredsson and Heatley combined for 93 goals in the regular season and scored 2 goals total in the series, both on the powerplay? Off with their heads!
• Havlat scored 6 goals in the first 5 games of the playoffs and scored 1 in the next 5? Here's your plane ticket, good riddance.
• Fisher, Schaefer, Vermette, Eaves, Neil and Smolinski all scored around 20 goals in the season but were virtual no-shows offensively throughout this series? I guess they've got to go.
• Chara and Redden may have singlehandedly lowered their own salaries through relatively inconsistent play which is a far cry from the Norris calibre performances we expect from them. Don't let the door hit you on the way out.
• Meszaros and Volchenkov virtually lost Game 1 on their own, with some timely help of the aforementioned Emery. Welcome to the NHL. Now get the hell outta my town!
• Coach Murray's line combinations changed on a seemingly daily basis, that is, except for putting the best line in the NHL back together. That idea is ludicrous! Well, Murray, out you go.
• GM John Muckler decides that a 41-year old goalie with a history of injury problems will "probably be ok" and that picking up an overweight, underachieving centre like Tyler Arnason at the trade deadline makes good sense because he'll look good sitting in the press box watching the games. You are the weakest link: GOODBYE!

As is rapidly becoming obvious, no Ottawa player or executive is legitimately exempt from the blame for the performance in this series. And yet, just as easily, if Ottawa had managed to put 3 shots in OT past Buffalo's goaltender, we'd be discussing Ottawa's "dominant" 5-game victory over Buffalo. The series result does not accurately reflect how close this one really was.

3. This isn't the same Senators team.

The parakeets who repeat the adage that "This Ottawa team can't succeed in the playoffs" haven't been paying attention to what happened to the roster over the lockout since the 2003-2004 season.

Ottawa had an entire slew of NHL rookies in the lineup which were to be relied upon this post-season: Emery, Eaves, Kelly, Schubert, Meszaros have never played in the NHL regularly before this season. Heatley has never played in the playoffs, and guys like Spezza, Volchenkov and Vermette have had extremely limited exposure.

Sometimes playoff lessons have to be learned all over again when you go out there with an entirely new team. Ottawa was the 2nd youngest team in the playoffs this year and at times during this series, that inexperience clearly showed.

Could Be Worse

When all is said and done, it could have been a lot worse. This Ottawa team faced more adversity this season than any other roster in a long time. Injuries were rampant throughout much of the year. People who expect the team to magically gel again after having a massively rotated line-up (including having our top 4 defencemen out at the same time) are kidding themselves. Meanwhile, in this "Stanley Cup or bust" town, our future Hall-of-Famer goaltender left the reins of the team to a kid.

We still managed to win the Conference, win a round of the playoffs and avoid a sweep.

Maybe if we didn't have such massive expectations, our players could go out and try to actually win a few games instead of hoping desperately not to lose.