From the Pressbox

Didn't get to see many of the Senators after Wednesday's loss; my duties entailed ducking champagne spray in the Anaheim room. (CBC gets the dry cleaning bill, the only one I submit all year). Seeing long-serving veterans Teemu Selanne and Todd Marchant and come-from-nowheres Andy McDonald and Dustin Penner overcome with emotion is the best part of covering hockey.

But, as Ron MacLean put it, "The great thing about sports is that there's a winner. The worst thing is that there's a winner."

Since I moved to HNIC four years ago, the team I've covered the most is Ottawa. I wouldn't say I'm friends with anyone, but there is certainly a friendly, working relationship. The Senators are great to deal with, a good group in a city that jumps off the bandwagon faster than any other in Canada.

Some examples: Last night, down 4-2 after two, victims of two heartbreaking goals, the team's media relations staff – Phil Legault and Steve Keogh – still brought out Mike Fisher for a between-periods interview. Many other teams would have said no. The captain showed up for a one-on-one right after the game, just as he did last year when he'd been victimized on the overtime winner that eliminated them from the playoffs.

(Before I was hired, I remember Wade Redden answering Scott Oake's questions in 2003 moments after they lost the seventh game of the East final to New Jersey.)

I really wanted to see what they looked like. Were they defiant (Ray Emery)? Were they stoic (Alfredsson)? Or, were they devastated (Chris Phillips, who deserved so much better than that brutal fluke after such a brilliant playoff)? Unfortunately, I had to rely on second hand information.

Over the past few years, Ottawa's playoff eliminations have been followed by general goofiness. Some of it came from fans, like the idiots who booed them at Scotiabank Place in Game 4, then blasted Alfredsson on the call-in shows the next day. There have been phone messages from the team president to season-ticket holders. Last year, one day after Bryan Murray told reporters Dominik Hasek and Tyler Arnason wouldn't be back, John Muckler said they might.

Despite the team's most successful playoff push since your grandmother was in diapers, there is similar potential this year. Murray and Muckler aren't exactly sharing a malt with two straws, and the coach doesn't yet have a contract for next year. (It didn't go unnoticed that Murray benched Corvo, Preissing and Comrie late last night. All three were Muckler acquisitions just before/during the season.) The GM took criticism for not making a big move at the deadline this year, but his little moves worked well and Brian Burke's only acquisition – Brad May – didn't cause a four-alarm blaze of excitement.

And, he just signed his number one defence pair (Phillips and Volchenkov) for $6 million – combined – per season. Think about it: Andrei Markov will now be getting $5.75 million – by himself – in Montreal. Bryan McCabe/Pavel Kubina make $10 million a year in Toronto.

Yikes!

Murray helped turn the Senators from a soft group of underachievers to Eastern Conference champions. His key guys like playing for him. That's important. He wants to stay in Ottawa near his feisty, funny, 87-year-old mother, Rhoda.

There is another factor: John Paddock. The assistant is doing a great job, and it's not going unnoticed. If the Senators want to keep him, they may have to promote him. And we all know Murray's been a GM. Burke openly credited him with building a good chunk of Anaheim's 2007 Stanley Cup champions.

See where I'm going here? But hold on.

Before the series, I asked Muckler if he would consider retiring should Ottawa win. He said no. I don't have the quote handy, but he said something along the lines of how much he still loved trying to build a champion. It was pretty fascinating, how people like him (five cups) and Scott Niedermayer (four) still burn to win even though they've won many times before.

Muckler said as long as he still had that feeling – which he clearly does – he wouldn't be racing to the early bird specials at the Del Boca Vista with Morty Seinfeld.

Both men want to stay. Both men deserve to stay. Both men should be forced to tolerate each other. But it doesn't always work that way. As for the team, these are the guys you don't worry about (in alphabetical order): Alfredsson, Fisher, Kelly, Phillips, Schubert, Vermette and Volchenkov. You know what you're getting from them and you're getting it every night.

Who's missing from that list? Well...

Jason Spezza and Dany Heatley: It's a joke that two weeks ago we're all falling over ourselves to praise these guys and now it's a race for the shovels to bury them. Look, these guys were overwhelmed in the final. They looked as nervous as a 15-year-old on his first date. But that's no reason to quit on them. We're forgetting the enormous improvements both made in their games this year. We're forgetting how they dominated three rounds in the playoffs against three 100-point teams. Grab some Quaaludes, everyone.

What we have to watch for next year is what they've learned from the experience. Heatley also struggled at the Torino Olympics, so there is some concern he's not cut out for the biggest stages. I don't know. He's 26. Spezza is 24.

However, Heatley will be a UFA after next season and Spezza will be restricted. Both will get big contracts. Should they be motivated by this disappointment, they will get every cent and deservedly so. If they don't improve from the experience, management may have to make a choice.

Wade Redden: If I have to make one bold prediction, it's that 2007-08 will be Redden's last in Ottawa. He's unrestricted next year, making $6.5 million per season. Should Spezza and Heatley get their raises, the Senators will need Redden's money to make it work.

Redden and Murray frustrated each other at times this season, but this will not be an acrimonious divorce. The organization really supported and aided the family through his mother's death last year, and he's been a major part of the franchise's transformation from laughingstock to contender. He privately worries about his father being alone on the farm in Lloydminster, SK and it's no secret the Oilers watched him very closely in the playoffs. That's the closest NHL team to home.

Only concern: While Redden was excellent against New Jersey and Buffalo, he had real trouble with aggressive forecheck teams that liked to punish defencemen (Pittsburgh and, of course, Anaheim).

Joe Corvo and Peter Schaefer: Both signed four-year deals last summer and struggled. Corvo – brutally hard on himself – was much better after a heart-to-heart with his father and father-in-law during the All-Star break. I thought he skated the puck real well during the playoffs and didn't think he was that bad in the final, but I seem to be in the minority.

Schaefer frustrated Murray with his lack of production, with the coach annoyed he didn't shoot enough. But he kills penalties and does great work along the boards. Their long-term contracts aren't for ridiculous salaries ($2.5 million average for Corvo, $2.1 million for Schaefer), but you have to wonder if Murray is really comfortable with them.

Chris Neil, Andrej Meszaros and Patrick Eaves: Next season will be important for these three. Not one of Jacques Martin's favourites, Neil took a big step in Season One under Murray, but dropped a little this year. It's no coincidence that Ottawa's only victory in the final came in his best performance, but he's got to learn to bring it every night. The Senators will give him every chance to succeed and he's worked so hard to get here that you can't see him blowing it.

Muckler likes Meszaros; feels he will be on the Ottawa blue-line for years. To everyone who thinks he took a step back this season, I ask this: Where did you expect this guy would be at age 21? Not the number four defenceman on a conference champion, I'd bet.

Eaves is only 23, but he's reaching a crossroads. He started the year with Spezza and Heatley, had two points on opening night, but never really gave Murray enough. He was a scratch five times in six games during March, and couldn't stay in the lineup when healthy during the playoffs. He's one of the only young Senators who hasn't shown the promise expected of him. Next year might be his last chance.

Dean McAmmond, Tom Preissing, Mike Comrie and Oleg Saprykin: The UFAs. McAmmond was a terrific player for Ottawa, playing all four lines, killing penalties with Alfredsson and scoring big postseason goals. Last I checked – during the Buffalo series – he hadn't talked contract with Muckler. If he wants to come back, I can't see any reason why they wouldn't want him. A real professional.

Muckler wants to re-sign Preissing, who made $600,000 last year. You can expect, though, that a 28-year-old defenceman coming off a 38-point, plus-40 season will get offers. Preissing struggled early with the change in style from San Jose to Ottawa and the pressure of playing here. He tells a great story about how he had a bad giveaway one night in Boston, and the next day some fans came up to him at an Ottawa mall to talk to him about it. He said, "They never had any clue who I was in California."

He grew to like it, but admits a big concern is if his fiancée – a teacher – can get a job here. Plus, the Game 5 benching might also play a factor, although I didn't get a chance to ask him about it.

Comrie played really hard for Ottawa, considering he was switched to wing for the first time in his career. He also played hurt, with his right shoulder frozen for much of the postseason. (The bruise was the size of Africa on a wall map.) All of this went a long way to changing the impression many had of him, and I know he really appreciated that. However, he was physically overmatched in the final and that may affect the kinds of offers he gets. He wants to play in a big city where hockey matters.

Ray Emery and Martin Gerber: This may be the most interesting decision of all. The former won 13 playoff games and, according to one long-time hockey executive, the 1-0 loss in Game 2 "was the best I've ever seen him play." But watching Brian Hayward and Kelly Hrudey say they would have gone to Gerber in Game 5 means people still need to be convinced. Some get caught up in the tattoos, the bug-eating bet, the cars, the clothes, whatever...but I see a 24-year-old who wasn't supposed to be the number one guy, yet put a chokehold on the position, wouldn't let go and got a franchise with a history of playoff defeat to within three wins of a drunken celebration on Parliament Hill.

Isn't that's what's supposed to matter?

It said a lot that Murray refused to yank him in the finale, because it shows the respect Emery's gained from his coach. However, the relationship between Muckler and Emery is still uneasy, complicated by the fact the GM isn't happy Emery has his personal goaltending guru, Eli Wilson, around. (Note to John: Give up on this one. I know you are being loyal to long-time friend Ron Low, but Low is comfortable with Wilson and it clearly works for the goalie.)

And, as usual, money will be a factor. If I was another team, I'd acquire Gerber as my backup, because he's been to three of the last four Finals in that position. Ottawa would probably move him, but at $3.7 million for each of the next two years, the market may not be too big.

The most interesting manoeuvre, though, might come from outside. There is a sense that, suddenly, there will be offer sheets made to restricted free agents after years of collusion. Emery is one. So is Buffalo's Thomas Vanek. Both teams have budgetary issues. Both players are young with star potential. If you were, say, an Eastern conference rival with money, wouldn't you want to target them?

All of this is why, after the series, some media members were saying they wouldn't be surprised if Gerber was the number one guy again next year.

Of course, the Senators will try to add a winger who can score, someone to play with Fisher. But at more than 2000 words, I've rambled on long enough.

It's going to be an interesting summer for the Eastern Conference champions.

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