Despite a quiet deadline, GM Steve Staios says he feels comfortable with his roster and described it as a good day.
Senators GM Steve Staios held court with the media on Friday after the trade deadline came and went. Now that all the smoke has cleared, Staios and the Senators did nothing on the final day. But on Thursday, they parted ways with veteran David Perron and Buffalo's 2026 second-round pick, and ended up with forward Warren Foegele and either a third or fourth-round pick.
It's a far cry from last year's deadline when Staios completely shook up his roster. In 2025, he picked up Dylan Cozens, Fabian Zetterlund, and Dennis Gilbert and parted ways with the very popular Josh Norris, along with Jacob-Bernard Docker, Zack Ostapchuk and Noah Gregor.
But that doesn't mean Staios wasn't busy this year.
"Plenty of conversations," Staios said. "I think we took the approach with this deadline that it was an opportunity, like always, to try and make our team better. So we looked at just about everything. At the end of the day, we feel very good about our team and the direction that it's moving, the way we've been playing more recently in particular."
So what did Staios like about Foegele, just as Perron is almost ready to return from sports hernia surgery?
"(Foegele) adds a little more speed to our lineup," Staios said. "He's a big body who can skate. He had back-to-back 20-goal seasons. You know, we liked that makeup of player.
"David was a good player for us. He brought a little bit of what we needed at the time. What David brings with him is experience and competitiveness at a time when this group was continuing to grow. We've certainly taken that next step as a group, but we felt like getting a guy like Warren into the lineup, who can play the right and left side, and get in on the forecheck, gets to the front of the net. And he's a big body that fits our style of play."
And what of Foegele's massive drop off in offensive production from last year to this year?
"Well, I think if he was on a 20-goal pace this year, he wouldn't have been available," Staios said.
"But we feel like just because of the makeup of (Foegele) and the way he plays the game and our style of play and the way our coaches like to play, we feel like it's a good opportunity for him to get back to his game and for us to get a very good player."
A lot of fans had their hearts set on an improvement on right defense, another top-six scorer, or maybe goaltending.
"We looked at everything. We really did. It wasn't like we approached this deadline with caution. We were aggressively looking for areas or ways to be able to improve our team. At the end of the day, whether the players weren't available to us or what it might have been, we felt comfortable with our group."
With Stephen Halliday suddenly being a healthy scratch on Thursday night in favour of tough guy Kurtis MacDermid, the logical conclusion was that Halliday may be part of a trade possibility. Staios insisted that Calgary is a physical team, and that MacDermid, who's been a healthy scratch for all of 2026 so far, can be a deterrent.
"It was the coach's decision on the lineup and the roster," Staios said.
When asked about why the trade deadline was so quiet this year, not just in Ottawa, Staios said he assumes it's because so many teams feel like they're still in it. But he still described it as a good day and that he's proud of his team's process.
So that's it. The 2025-26 Senators are what they are. Now, with 21 games to play, it's time to see if they can claw their way back into contention.
Steve Warne
The Hockey News