Travis Green addressed the team's toughness level entering the new season and what it means to be tough in 2026.
The concept of toughness in the NHL has evolved over the years. "Tough" used to be a label for players you'd rather not face in a fight, and the best ones usually weren't that good at any other aspect of the game.
In the 80s and 90s, every NHL team had at least one enforcer. Some had two or three.
Today, there are still a few players around who are exclusively enforcers, but not many. And the ones that still remain, like Kurtis MacDermid here in Ottawa, are a healthy scratch for a lot more games than not.
So players who can fight and actually contribute in your bottom six are valuable. Two years ago, the Sens let two guys like that go: Mark Kastelic (Ullmark deal) and Zack Ostapchuk (Zetterlund deal).
But guys who can fight and play in your top six are unicorns, and as much as Sens fans don't want to indulge in praise for Brady Tkachuk, he was one of those guys for Ottawa.
And he's gone now too.
So the question now among a lot of the fan base is this: Do the Senators have enough toughness?
"Obviously, Brady brought some elements to the game that are hard to find," head coach Travis Green said this week on the Coming in Hot Podcast. "You just don't go and replace a guy like that, but I do think our team is tough enough. I do. And that's going to come internally.
"We've got some... definitely, some guys that can handle themselves and more than handle themselves."
With Tkachuk out of the lineup with a hand injury for the early part of last season and then wearing a brace for a good chunk of the rest, the Sens got a good long preview of what life will be like without Tkachuk's physicality.
But Green believes toughness is more than the ability to drop the gloves.
"There's fighting, and then there's playing team-tough. And, you know, I think we have more than enough team toughness to handle ourselves. We've got some guys that we can put in the lineup who enjoy the fighting part as well.
"I'm not worried about that part of our game with our group.
They still have Kurtis MacDermid, who only played 19 games last season, and Hayden Hodgson, who played just 10. They would rank 1-2 in terms of the club's best fighters in the organization.
Host Brent Wallace asked if some of those types of players, guys like MacDermid or Hayden Hodgson, would be in the lineup for October 21st when Tkachuk makes his return to Ottawa with the Florida Panthers.
"You'll have to come to the game and watch," Green joked.
By Steve Warne
The Hockey News
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