Ottawa Senators’ Offence Still a Question Mark in 2024-25 – The Hockey Writers – Ottawa Senators

On the Sept. 12 episode of The Hockey Writers Roundtable, my colleague Jacob Billington and I disagreed on whether the Ottawa Senators were packing enough offensive punch to be successful this season (discussion at 9:43). I argued they were not, noting that not one of the Senators’ much-ballyhooed group of young guns cracked the NHL’s top 10 list of point-getters last season, or for that matter, the list of the top 20. Billington countered, arguing that there are successful teams such as the Vegas Golden Knights without players on the top 10 list. Not only that, but it’s only a few teams that actually have players on that list. In his view, the Senators’ firepower wasn’t a question mark for 2024-25.

Related: 5 Burning Questions for the Ottawa Senators in 2024-25

So I decided to do a deep dive into the statistics to see how important having league-leading point-getters is to winning teams. What I found is that it’s critical and that the Senators don’t have any players who are remotely top-tier point producers. That goes a long way to explaining their seven-year playoff drought.

Let’s have a look at what the cold hard numbers say about Ottawa’s offensive firepower.

Most NHL Playoff Teams Have Top-20 Point Producers

Last season, seven of the 16 teams that won a berth in the playoffs had players who were among the NHL’s top 10 point-getters. If you consider playoff teams with players who were among the league’s top 20 point-getters, that number rises to 10 of 16 teams. Three of four playoff teams last season had skaters who were among the league’s top 30 point-scorers.

There were only four playoff teams last season who had rosters that didn’t have anyone who managed to crack the league’s top 40 point-scorers. They were the Washington Capitals, Vegas, the Winnipeg Jets and the Los Angeles Kings. Of those four teams, two managed to claw their way into the playoffs via a wild card spot and none of them made it past the first round. The moral of the story is that having players among the league’s top 20 or so point generators is critical for success.

And therein lies the trouble for the Senators based on last season’s statistics. Brady Tkachuk led the Senators last season with 37 goals and 37 assists for 74 points. Yet that was only good enough to rank him 41^st in points in the NHL. Tim Stutzle, the number two Senator points-wise last season with 70 of them to his credit, ranked 51^st in the…