If we're being charitable, we have to acknowledge that the underlying numbers are solid and even the overall goal difference is only a shade underwater.

But if we're being realistic, you can't spend all summer spiking the football and doing over-complicated end-zone dances about all the brilliant trades and signings you pulled off -- whether it's online, through the local media, or when you're talking about your ticket sales -- and then start out the season four games below the NHL's bogus version of .500, dead last in the division.

We were told time and again that this was the season in which the Senators didn't have to make the playoffs necessarily, but they did need to be in the race for a spot around the deadline, if not beyond that . "Playing meaningful games," was the term used again a