There is hope amid adversity

Banged-up Sens could still make it into playoffs

OTTAWA — When the lockout ended and the NHL announced a condensed 48-game schedule, mayhem was forecast.

And still, we’re astounded by the developments a third of the way through the season. Namely: The Chicago Blackhawks and Anaheim Ducks chewing up a tough Western Conference as though it were AHL competition. Before Wednesday’s games, the gap from first place to eighth in the West was 12 points. In the East, it’s six.

While only one was widely forecast to get in, all three eastern Canadian teams sit in a playoff position: the Montreal Canadiens flirting with first, the Toronto Maple Leafs playing unlikely road warriors and the Senators hanging on despite missing its top three scorers — Norris Trophy winner Erik Karlsson among them — from last season. Can it last?

Among those outside the top eight looking in — the New York Rangers, one of the pre-season favourites and three others that made the playoffs last season: Florida, Philadelphia and Washington. The Buffalo Sabres, picked by so many to be a much-improved team, are a dog’s breakfast.

All in all, this movable feast of mediocrity called the Eastern Conference may yet be the land of opportunity to teams that might otherwise have no shot at qualifying for the post-season. When Karlsson tore his Achilles heel, compliments of Matt Cooke’s seeing-eye skate blade, the Senators were instantly rated a lost cause for the season.

Maybe they still are. Maybe they wake up one day and realize they have no business contemplating playoffs without a top pairing (or at least a top four) in defenceman Jared Cowen; without Karlsson, who was raising the bar on Norris candidacy until he was injured; without No. 1 centre Jason Spezza and without Milan Michalek, whose knee injury is becoming a concern.

But as long as goaltender Craig Anderson is keeping the Senators in every game and the team sends out a pesky band of rookies with a few choice veterans sprinkled in, they’re not admitting to any lost cause. Tuesday’s 3-1 victory over the New York Islanders was a case in point. Senators head coach Paul MacLean admitted his group was the second best team on the ice, but survived. Mostly because of Anderson.

Captain Daniel Alfredsson said afterward he believes a top-eight finish is a reasonable goal, despite the dark cloud of injury lingering overhead.

“I do,” Alfredsson said, when the question was popped. “I mean, it’s so many games in so short a time and if you can get something good going, you ride the energy, the positive wave you’ve got going.”

Most nights — the careless play against the Islanders being the exception — the Senators make the appropriate effort and push. Given their circumstances, they should be frightened into making it.

“All we know is, on paper maybe we shouldn’t maybe be at the top or in the playoffs, but we control what we do,” Alfredsson said.

“We’re going to go out there and give a gutsy effort every night. I think we all know we need four lines going hard.”

With seven or eight rookies in the lineup on any given night, the Senators have to accept the good with the bad.

“I think we make mistakes out there sometimes, that maybe if you had more skill or more veteran guys out there that you wouldn’t,” Alfredsson said. “But I think we work to overcome that.”

“The coaching staff has done a great job in that we’re not looking for excuses,” Alfredsson said. “We have what we have and we’re going to give everything we have.”

There’s a handy slogan for the stretch run.