Senators most to blame for ugly Round 1 sweep against Hurricanes

The good news for the Ottawa Senators is that they returned to the Stanley Cup Playoffs for a second straight year after putting together an impressive second half of the 2025-26 NHL regular season.

The bad news is that they were matched up against the Eastern Conference-winning Carolina Hurricanes, who are known for their ability to completely smother and suffocate their opponents. Ottawa’s stay in the postseason was an extremely short one; the Canes won all four games against the Senators, sweeping them aside and becoming the first club to advance to the second round of the 2026 playoffs.

The Hurricanes sealed the Senators’ fate on Saturday with a 4-2 victory at the Canadian Tire Centre, ending their campaign early once again.

While there is plenty of blame to go around, one player the fingers of critics won’t be pointed at is goaltender Linus Ullmark, who did everything in his power to give the Senators the best possible chance of making life uncomfortable for Carolina. Despite going 0-4, Ullmark posted an impressive 2.03 goals-against average and a .932 save percentage, stats that should have been more than enough to at least get a win or two.

In fact, Ullmark’s save percentage and goals-against average from the recently completed playoff series are the best he’s posted in his playoff career. It’s certainly unfair that he wasn’t rewarded with a single win, but that’s the nature of professional sports.

In the meantime, there are other notable players on the Senators who didn’t come through for their team, unlike Ullmark.

Senators captain Brady Tkachuk didn’t record a single point

The Senators were banking on big things from Brady Tkachuk, their captain and on-ice emotional leader. Earlier this year, he’d gotten a taste of what achieving ultimate glory feels like when he helped lead Team USA to a victory over Team Canada in the 2026 Winter Olympics, winning the gold medal for the first time since the famous “Miracle On Ice” squad of 1980.

However, there was no gold medal-worthy performance on Tkachuk’s part in the short four-game sweep his team suffered. Not only did Tkachuk not find the back of the net once, but he also didn’t register a single assist. As if that weren’t enough, he also posted a disappointing minus-four rating.

It’s a far cry from his performance at this time last year during his first postseason series, scoring four goals and adding three assists in Ottawa’s six-game elimination against the provincial rival Toronto Maple Leafs. Though Ottawa didn’t win that series, Tkachuk was a force for his club.

That wasn’t the case this time around, and all that can be said is that he didn’t come through. This is now leading to widespread speculation that Tkachuk’s days in Ottawa could be numbered. Until that gets sorted out, it was nothing short of a disappointing showing for him in Ottawa’s second straight postseason appearance.

Top forward Tim Stützle registered only a single point 

The bad news for the Senators is that Tkachuk wasn’t the only high-profile forward who struggled offensively against the Hurricanes. Forward Tim Stützle was held to a single point, which was an assist in the fourth and final game of the series on Saturday.

His plus-minus rating wasn’t anything impressive either, as he finished with a woeful minus-four rating for the series. Like Tkachuk, it’s the opposite of what he produced for the Senators in their opening-round series loss against the Maple Leafs last spring, in which he scored twice while adding three assists; he also finished with a plus-one rating.

Both Michael Amadio and Warren Foegele also went pointless

Forward Michael Amadio, a fixture in Ottawa’s bottom-six, performed consistently during the regular season by scoring 15 goals with 20 assists to register a new career-high in points with 35. But he didn’t register so much as a shot on goal during the entire series.

While Amadio wasn’t counted upon to be a primary source of offense for the Senators, a well-balanced team needs production from support players, especially with how tight things get in the postseason.

Speaking of secondary scoring, the Senators appeared to have gotten some from former Hurricanes forward Warren Foegele, who was acquired mid-season from the Los Angeles Kings and settled into a bottom-six role before eventually being elevated to the club’s top line in an effort to spark the offense.

But like Tkachuk and Amadio, Foegele failed to register a single point during the four-game sweep at the hands of the club he spent his first handful of years in the NHL playing for.

There is certainly a lot of blame to go around, but it doesn’t help that Ottawa’s blue line was riddled with injury throughout the series, and Jake Sanderson suffering a concussion was probably the dagger. Still, it was a  hugely disappointing postseason in Canada’s capital.

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