The Ottawa Senators are heading into the 2026-27 season with a different kind of pressure after trading captain Brady Tkachuk to the Florida Panthers, and former NHL executive Pierre McGuire says the answer won’t come from one dramatic replacement.
On “The Sick Podcast - Sens Spotlight,” McGuire said Ottawa can still stay in the playoff mix, but only if it keeps the identity it built last season and sharpens the details that matter most. For him, that starts with the power play and the coaching staff.
“The power play really has to be effective,” McGuire said. He also singled out Travis Green, adding, “I’m glad you brought up Travis Green’s name.”
Ottawa’s 2025-26 season gave the organization a real foundation to work from. The Senators went 44-27-11 for 99 points, finished eighth in the NHL with 275 goals, and then were swept by the Carolina Hurricanes in the first round.
That offensive output is part of why Alex Adams raised the question of whether Ottawa can still be a top-10 scoring team without Tkachuk. McGuire’s answer was less about one player’s numbers and more about how the Senators stack up inside the Atlantic Division.
“If Ottawa can figure out a way as a coaching staff to be better than Boston and Detroit, they have a fighting chance to get in,” McGuire said.
He went even further with his outlook for the division race. “I think five teams from the Atlantic are going to make it,” he said.
Ottawa has already tried to patch the loss of Tkachuk by bringing in William Eklund and additional draft assets. The Senators also added Andre Burakovsky while keeping veterans Claude Giroux and Nick Cousins in the fold.
Still, McGuire’s bigger point was that Ottawa’s edge last season came from something less flashy than raw scoring. He questioned whether the Senators have enough offense to keep pace with the Atlantic’s best, then pointed to the way they played as the real reason they were tough to handle.
“But the one thing that Ottawa did last year that allowed them… the one thing they did that was really good, they were really hard to play against,” McGuire said. “Not because they were dirty, not because they were big, not because they were mean.
They were structured. They were layered.
They created a really difficult scheme to try to play against.”
He tied that approach directly to Green’s background as a player.
“It was vintage, the way Travis used to play as a player,” McGuire said. “That’s what they have to carry over this year.”
For Ottawa, the formula is clear enough. Replacing Tkachuk’s production with one player is not realistic. The Senators will need balanced scoring, a better power play, and steady goaltending from Linus Ullmark if they want to keep moving forward.
They still have a strong young core with Tim Stutzle, Jake Sanderson, and Thomas Chabot. But in a crowded Atlantic, the games that matter most may be the ones against Boston and Detroit. That’s where Ottawa’s playoff path could be decided.
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