Senators getting votes for their all-around play

Sporting News, The, March 8, 1999 by Larry Wigge

Through last Sunday's games. The NHL Power Poll is determined by TSN hockey editors.

RELATED ARTICLE: Devilish dissension

Don't look now, but one of the Senator's biggest rivals in the Eastern Conference is having trouble in the locker room. The Devils, known for their great defense even when they were scoring goals earlier this season, have fallen to 11th in the league on defense--and defenseman Ken Daneyko and center Bobby Carpenter aired some of their dirty laundry.

"Some people have asked why the defenseman are no longer pinching to help the offense," Daneyko says. "Because when we do, we get caught. The forwards aren't there to back us up."

Says Carpenter, "Maybe they're just pinching at the wrong times. If we get caught 2-on-1, it's the defenseman's mistake. If we get caught 3-on-2, it the forward's mistake."

Meanwhile, the Flyers, the Senators' other main competition, were left wondering how they went 16-1-7 from December 12 through February 6 but in their next nine games were 2-6-1, including an embarrassing 4-1 loss to the lowly Lightning.

"The Flyers and Devils don't have the most mobile defense," Lightning coach Jacques Demers says. "They prefer to stay back and bang you. If you can put pressure on their defense, a quick transition team can beat either of them."

--L.W.

RELATED ARTICLE: The book on ... Fredrick Olausson

Mighty Ducks, Defenseman 6-0/198

If you turn back the clock a decade you would find defenseman in Winnipeg who would score 20 goals in the 1991-92 season and average 55 points in a five-year period. But that hard-shooting blue liner began coasting and was nearly booed out of Manitoba.

Now, at 32, Olausson is making a comeback. With 44 points through last Saturday, he's a threat to lead all NHL defensemen in points. Earlier this season, he became the 36th--and only the second non-North American--defensemen to score 500 career points.

This resurgence almost didn't happen. While his new teammates were in training camp in September, Olausson, who had been signed away from Pittsburgh as a free agent, was undergoing tests for an enlarged spleen. "I wasn't ready to retire, but the doctors thought I might have to have my spleen removed, and that would have meant my career was probably over."

After getting the OK for the start of the season, Olausson finally went on the offensive on December 11. In his next 24 games, he produced 10 goals and 14 assists--and got the Mighty Ducks into playoff contention by moving the puck up the ice and firing his hard slap shot from the point opposite Paul Kariya on the power play. "When we were in Winnipeg together, the fans either loved him for his wicked shot or they hated him for his subdued play," teammate Teemu Selanne says. "Now he's our plus-minus leader."

Three years removed from being sent to the scrap heap by Oilers G.M. Glen Sather, Olausson, has changed a lot of minds this season. Says Sather, "Freddie looks like he's finally found those skills we always thought he had but couldn't extract in Edmonton."