{"id":184347,"date":"2025-10-02T05:54:11","date_gmt":"2025-10-02T05:54:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/184347\/"},"modified":"2025-10-02T05:54:11","modified_gmt":"2025-10-02T05:54:11","slug":"senators-season-preview-pieces-in-place-to-make-deep-playoff-run","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/184347\/","title":{"rendered":"Senators season preview: Pieces in place to make deep playoff run"},"content":{"rendered":"

Most intriguing addition<\/p>\n

Ottawa hopes to be even stingier this season after acquiring 24-year-old defenseman Jordan Spence<\/a> in a trade with the Los Angeles Kings on June 28 for a third-round pick in the 2025 NHL Draft and a sixth-round pick in the 2026 NHL Draft. Spence set NHL career highs in goals (four), assists (24), points (28) and plus\/minus (plus-23) last season, and he still has plenty of room to grow. He projects to start alongside Tyler Kleven<\/a>, 23, as part of the third defense pair, but there is certainly potential to move up the lineup one day. Add that pair to a defense core that already includes budding star Jake Sanderson<\/a>, Artem Zub<\/a>, Thomas Chabot<\/a> and Nick Jensen<\/a>, and the future is bright for Ottawa\u2019s blue line.<\/p>\n

Biggest potential surprise<\/p>\n

Leevi Merilainen<\/a> is poised to show the hockey world he\u2019s more than a six-week wonder. From Dec. 21-Feb. 1, the 23-year-old stepped up in place of Ullmark, who was dealing with a back injury, and went 8-3-1 with a 1.99 GAA, .925 save percentage and three shutouts. The Senators believed such a small body of work was indicative of his potential and signed him to a one-year, one-way contract on June 28, opting not to re-sign former backup Anton Forsberg<\/a> in the process. The Senators are banking on Merilainen being the real deal, and he\u2019s out to prove them right.<\/p>\n

Ready to contribute<\/p>\n

Spence\u2019s arrival could keep top prospect Carter Yakemchuk<\/a> off the NHL roster to start the season. If that\u2019s the way it plays out, though, it\u2019s just a matter of time before Yakemchuk becomes a mainstay on the Senators’ blue line. The 20-year-old, who was selected with the No. 7 pick in the 2024 NHL Draft, made a solid bid to make the Senators roster out of training camp last season by getting seven points (two goals, five assists) in four preseason games, but the decision was ultimately made to return him to Calgary of the Western Hockey League. One year later, and he\u2019s again been turning heads at camp.<\/p>\n

Fantasy sleeper with EDGE stats<\/p>\n

Dylan Cozens<\/a>, F: The 24-year-old center had 16 points (five goals, 11 assists), including eight on the power play, in 21 games with Ottawa last season after being acquired in a trade with the Buffalo Sabres on March 7. He also finished with NHL career highs in hits (205) and blocked shots (45). Cozens is expected to remain on the second line this season, as well as on the top power-play unit, and should bring exposure to elite fantasy options in Tkachuk, Stutzle and Sanderson. Cozens has shown his ability to score goals in the past (career-high 31 with the Sabres in 2022-23), and he should be attainable outside the top 175 overall based on fantasy average draft position. Per NHL EDGE stats, Cozens ranked among the NHL leaders in forwards in midrange shots on goal (91; 96th percentile), midrange goals (10; 90th percentile) and speed bursts between 20-22 mph (139; 84th percentile). — Troy Perlowitz<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Most intriguing addition Ottawa hopes to be even stingier this season after acquiring 24-year-old defenseman Jordan Spence in…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":184348,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[556],"tags":[64,63,575,85],"class_list":{"0":"post-184347","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-nhl","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-nhl","11":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/184347","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=184347"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/184347\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/184348"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=184347"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=184347"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=184347"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}