Jacob Chychrun’s hit on Nick Cousins on Tuesday night did more than stop play. It reopened an old conversation about what kind of edge the Senators actually have when things get heated.
The hit itself is not really the issue. The bigger debate is what followed, or didn’t follow, from Ottawa.
With about three minutes left in a tied game, the Senators chose not to turn the moment into a fight, and that decision came with a clear risk: an instigator penalty could have handed the Capitals a power play in a game that was still hanging in the balance. A couple minutes later, Fabian Zetterlund was whistled for delay of game anyway.
Under those circumstances, Ottawa handled it the right way.
Still, plenty of fans are asking the same thing after Cousins was left motionless on the ice: who on this roster answers that kind of hit? That’s where the discussion shifts from one play to a bigger roster question.
The comparison that immediately comes to mind is Chris Neil. Like the Chychrun hit, Neil’s famous blowup of Johnny Boychuk was clean.
He glided into the check, drove his shoulder into Boychuk’s chest, and delivered a textbook hit with no head contact. If you’re being honest, it’s probably the kind of hit many people cheered from wherever they were.
Chychrun’s hit had that same hard, punishing feel. He glided into the contact as well, and as ugly as it looked watching Cousins lie there, the no-penalty call was the correct one.
But the real issue is not whether the hit was legal. It’s whether the Senators have anyone left who can make sure a moment like that doesn’t go unanswered if the game situation allows it.
That’s the void Steve Staios has not filled since he traded Brady Tkachuk.
Staios has said the Senators are a difficult team to play against, and in one sense he’s right. Travis Green and his staff have the group playing a tight, detailed system.
Ottawa is hard to play against when the puck is moving. It is not nearly as intimidating between whistles.
Staios knows that side of the game better than most. He played 1,001 regular season games and piled up 1,322 penalty minutes, with his career split fairly evenly between pre- and post-lockout hockey. He understood what it meant to have players who could hold others accountable because he was one of them.
He tried to add that kind of presence with Kurtis MacDermid, but MacDermid couldn’t provide enough elsewhere to justify staying in the lineup.
That’s the challenge in today’s NHL. The players who can both police the game and play regular minutes are rare, and valuable. If Ottawa is rebuilding its roster with that reality in mind, it still looks like it could use one or two more of them.
The Senators haven’t had a Chris Neil since he retired. Back when Neil was around, Zack Smith and Mark Borowiecki were there too, and that mix mattered. It doesn’t take a full roster of enforcers to change the temperature of a team.
There are a few names on the current roster who might fit that mold to some degree - Hayden Hodgson, Ridly Greig, or perhaps Tyler Kleven - but Ottawa doesn’t really have a true intimidating presence in the way Neil once was.
The five players on the ice for the Chychrun hit were Sanderson, Zub, Batherson, Pinto and Cousins. Whether Chychrun gave any thought to who was out there before he stepped in for the hit is impossible to know.
He almost certainly meant to land a heavy one, the kind that echoes the Neil-Boychuk memory. Whether he expected to answer for it is another matter.
And that’s why this conversation isn’t going away. The league may decide this is one way to attack the Senators, which makes this a roster issue worth treating as a priority.
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