Senators to build wing with 28th pick Too much talent up front to ignore in this year's draft

OTTAWA – The Ottawa Senators made the playoffs as a two seed in the Atlantic Division and scared the pants out of their opponents once they got there making it all the way to the Eastern Conference finals. Despite the loss you can best optimism reigns supreme in Ottawa these days. A lot of question marks remain for the upcoming season but a few of those questions will be answered on Friday in Chicago when the 2017 NHL Entry Draft begins.

The bad news for Ottawa was the fact that they were 22nd in offense, 23rd on the power play, and 22nd on the penalty kill. The good news is they were 10th in defense and on face-offs. The Sens were pretty solid overall on offense with three players with over 20 goals and nine players with 10 or more, four of them were centers. Ottawa had two other players with 10 goals. Overall the team is in good shape offensively but the expansion draft will prove interesting considering who got exposed.

The blueline is in good shape led by Erik Karlsson. Adding another blueliner to the core would be a bad option for the Sens come draft day. With the 28th overall selection, in a forward heavy draft, we expect to still see a lot of quality goal scorers still available by the time the Senators come up to the podium to make their pick.

Isaac Ratcliffe, Shane Bowers, Robert Thomas, Kole Lind, and Grant Mismash are still on the board as well as Maxim Comtois and Nikita Popugaev. Still, we get the feeling someone else might still be on the board who might be a better option. If the Sens decide to go with a defenseman Henri Jokiharju is a good option at #28.

With that said, we expect to hear the following announcement come draft day.

“With the 28th overall selection in the 2017 NHL Draft, the Ottawa Senators select, from the Kingston Frontenacs of the Ontario Hockey League, Jason Robertson.”