Records are made to be broken.
Last season, Tim Stutzle became the youngest player in the Ottawa Senators’ franchise history to hit 90 points and just the second 20-year-old to score over 30 goals. Meanwhile, Brady Tkachuk cemented his lead for the most shots in a single season and is the only player to score at least 30 goals and record over 100 penalty minutes, a feat that he’s already done twice before age 25. On defence, Jake Sanderson’s 32 points was the third-highest total ever recorded by a teenager.
With so much talent on the roster, it seems like a matter of time before some long-standing franchise records are broken. Here are six single-season records that will almost certainly have a new title holder at the end of the 2023-24 season.
Most Goals: Dany Heatley – 50 (2005-06 and 2006-07)
In 2005-06, the Senators acquired Dany Heatley from the Atlanta Thrashers. They immediately put him on the top line alongside Jason Spezza and Daniel Alfredsson, creating one of the best lines in franchise history. Nicknamed the CASH line after their initials (Captain Alfredsson, Spezza, Heatley) as well as the Pizza line because of an in-arena promotion that gave everyone a slice of pizza if the team scored at least five goals, the line propelled the team to their first Stanley Cup Final in 2007. It also created the organization’s first 50-goal scorer in Heatley, who would cross that threshold twice in consecutive seasons.
Related: 5 NHL Records That Will Be Broken
Could we finally see a second Senator cross that 50-goal plateau? No one has come all that close since Heatley left for the San Jose Sharks in 2009-10; only Spezza and Milan Michalek have crossed the 30-goal mark before Tkachuk and Josh Norris joined them in 2021-22. Then Stutzle put up a surprising 39 goals in 2022-23, making him the highest scorer in over a decade.
ESPN projected Stutzle to score 40 goals this season, making him the first player to do so since 2007-08 and putting him within 10 goals of claiming the franchise record. It’s a tall ask for him to do that this season and arguably one of the least likely records to be broken on this list, but that target is not as far away as many thought it once was. It will also be interesting to see if Norris can compete for the goal-scoring lead after leading the team in 2021-22. In any case, there are three players – Stutzle, Norris, and Tkachuk – who could all break this long-standing record in the near future.
Most Points: Dany Heatley – 105 (2006-07)
Although 50 goals is slightly unrealistic this season, Heatley’s 105-point season seems much more reachable. Most point projections place Stutzle well into the 90-point range and retain his place at the top of the Senators’ scoring chart, with Last Word on Sports going one step further, claiming the German phenom could be the first Senator to break through the 100-point plateau since 2006-07 with a total of 105.
But Stutzle isn’t the unanimous choice to lead the team in points this season, as NHL.com projects Tkachuk to finish with a team-leading 90 points. That feels like a reasonable jump for the Senators’ captain, who posted a career-high 83 points last season. But what about hitting 100?
There’s an interesting argument to be made when looking at Brady’s brother, Matthew. In his first five seasons in the NHL, he was one of the top pests in the league but couldn’t get past 35 goals and 80 points. Then came 2021-22, when he broke out with 42 goals and 104 points. To prove it wasn’t a fluke, he scored 40 goals and 109 points in his first season with the Florida Panthers. Will Brady follow in those footsteps? The pair play very similar styles, and 2023-24 will be his sixth season with the Senators, so we will know soon enough whether he will erupt with a 100-point season.
Most Goals, Defenceman: Erik Karlsson – 21 (2014-15)
Erik Karlsson’s 82 points in 2015-16 is fairly safe for now, but his 21 goals could surpassed by one of the team’s newest acquisitions, Jacob Chychrun. ESPN projects the defender to hit 61 points in 2023-24, with 16 of those coming in the way of goals. That’s just two away from his previous career high of 18, which he put up in 2020-21 despite playing just 56 games, and he already has two pre-season goals in just two games, one of which was a game-winner. Scoring just five more doesn’t seem much of a reach, especially if he stays on the top pairing alongside Thomas Chabot.
In the same vein, Chychrun could also challenge for the longest consecutive goal streak, which currently sits at just three goals and is held by eight different players, including Chabot, who did it in 2021-22. If Chychrun can score 21 goals, he surely can put at least three of those in consecutive games.
The only problem is that Chychrun just can’t stay healthy. Since making his NHL debut in 2016-17, he has never played more than 68 games in a single season. Last season was one of his worst, too, as he played just 48 games split between the Arizona Coyotes and Senators. After his pre-season chemistry with Thomas Chabot, hopes are high that he can stay healthy for most of the season, but it’s difficult to know for sure if he’ll stay injury-free in 2023-24.
Most Consecutive Goals: Connor Brown – 8 (2020-21)
It feels strange to see the title of most consecutive goals held not by Heatley, Alfredsson, or Spezza but by Connor Brown, who never scored more than 21 goals in his career. In 2020-21, the year in which he set his personal best, he scored nearly half of all his goals in an eight-game stretch between March and April.
Clearly, the feat is not easy; Heatley and Alfredsson topped out with six consecutive goals in 2006-07, as did Spezza in 2009-10. But there are a couple of Senators that could make their case this season. The most likely candidate is Drake Batherson, who sits tied for second with a six-game goal streak from 2020-21. But veteran Claude Giroux quietly put up a five-game goal streak last season, as did rookie Shane Pinto, who scored five goals in his first six games. But this record might come down to luck; after all, Bob Kudelski also sits second with a six-game goal streak in 1993-94.
Most Overtime Goals: Mike Fisher – 3 (2009-10)
Mike Fisher was a fan favourite during his 11 seasons with the team and is still remembered fondly by the team and city despite finishing his career with the Nashville Predators. He wasn’t an offensive juggernaut, but he scored when it counted, leading him to set a record with seven overtime goals in 675 games with the Senators, as well as the most in a single season with three in the 2009-10 season.
But there’s a new clutch player in Ottawa who will almost certainly dethrone Fisher this season. In just 359 games, Tkachuk already has six overtime goals, and last season, he was just one of two players to score multiple overtime goals, putting him within one goal of the single-season record. He’s the go-to guy for Ottawa when it comes to big moments, and there’s no question that he loves the spotlight.
Most Multi-Point Games: Daniel Alfredsson – 32 (2005-06)
In Ottawa, no player has more individual records than Alfredsson. He’s the team’s leader in goals (426) and points (1108) and was the longest-serving captain, wearing the ‘C’ for 13 seasons. So, it’s no surprise to learn that he also leads the team in the most multi-point games in a single season with 32, which he set in 2005-06. However, that record won’t last past the 2023-24 season, at least, if Stutzle has anything to say about it.
In 2022-23, Stutzle finished the season with 31 multi-point games in which he scored at least two points. If he can build on his 90 points in 2023-24, he should easily hit that number again, making this record all but broken already. But could he go further? Alfredsson also holds the record for the most games with three or more points with 12, which also came in 2005-06, whereas Stutzle sits a ways back at just seven. Alexei Yashin leads the Senators with the most four-point games with four in 1998-99, but Stutzle hit that three times last season, tying Alfredsson’s total from 2007-08. All those feel within reach for the Senators’ young star.
The Senators are still a relatively young franchise, having existed since 1992-93. That means that their records aren’t nearly as impressive as their rivals; no one is touching Guy Lafleur’s 136 points from 1976-77 any time soon. But smaller records mean that there are ample opportunities to break them. This team is one of the best that Ottawa has ever put together, so breaking records may become a regular occurrence as they fight for the toughest record to break – winning their first Stanley Cup.
