Senators' Tim Stutzle stepping up after last season's disappointment

OTTAWA —  Lights out would be one way to describe Tim Stutzle’s performance to start the 2024-25 season.

As the Ottawa Senators’ 8-1 thrashing of the St. Louis Blues approached the final buzzer Tuesday, Sens fans raucously chanted: “We want playoffs.” 

For the team to make the playoffs, Stutzle will have to continue his dominant play. It was on display during a four-point outing against the Blues, which followed a pre-game power outage that delayed the start of the contest.

The Senators are now 5-4-0, the first time they have managed five wins in their first 10 games since 2016-2017, when they last made the playoffs.

The old adage states “your best players have to be your best players", and that has been the case with Stutzle early this season.

He had a breakthrough campaign in 2022-23 with 90 points. But with that standard set, last season was a disappointment. He fell below the point-per-game threshold with 70 points in 75 games.

“I wasn't happy with the season and how it ended up last year,” the 22-year-old German said. “I didn't feel great over 82 games, so I wanted to be better for 82 games and be consistent. I think it's really important to do consistent things every day, even if you feel good or not. You've just got to do it every day and come to work well prepared. And I think that's really important for me this year, focus on little things.”

Stutzle has tallied a point in all but one of the Senators’ games this season.

Talk about consistency.

When Senators coach Travis Green was asked about Stutzle’s commitment to the little details in his play after Tuesday’s game, his praise was effusive. “Timmy has worked hard and is trying to become a real, complete player that can win when it matters.”

Stutzle is a career -62 plus/minus player but he demonstrated his defensive chops in the first period against St. Louis with the Senators owning a 2-0 lead but the game still in the balance. It got the attention of Ottawa goaltender Linus Ullmark.

“Timmy, (when) it was 3-0 he does a sick backcheck, grabs a puck on a broken play, goes down and buries it,” said Ullmark. “If he doesn't do that job beforehand, he's not going to have the opportunity to score. And it's for us to understand that that's how we have to play every night.”

Stutzle overheard Ullmark’s remark to reporters in the locker room after the game and began to cheer and smile. When the media scrum was over, Stutzle told Ullmark, “I love that.” The two conversed and dapped each other out.

Now in his fifth season, Stutzle is taking on a leadership role.

"Tim actually reached out to me, to say I was doing a good job at camp,” young prospect Stephen Halliday said during training camp. “I was pretty fanboyish.”

Halliday told Sportsnet that he asked Stutzle for a dinner recommendation for a group of prospects going out together. When they got to the nice Italian restaurant Stutzle had suggested, he was notified that Stutzle had already paid the bill.

Meanwhile, Stutzle has been working on looking after himself. In the off-season, he consulted a nutritionist. He said that he feels “way better” and is in the process of hiring a personal chef. He also said he is taking recovery naps before every game.

“Obviously, after the (2022-23) season, before last year, I felt like I got a lot better ... and I was more confident,” Stutzle said. “And it's not always going to go the right way and the way you want it to go. And obviously, as a whole team, I think it was a disappointing, disappointing year for us. So, I just kind of reset over the summer and I got healthy.”

Stutzle has been paired up with captain Brady Tkachuk for most of the season. But on Tuesday, Green decided to insert Ridly Greig on the top line at right wing. Greig’s insertion led to the line outshooting the Blues 17-11. It’s part of a consistent story for Stutzle: when he’s been on the ice this season at five-on-five, the Senators have outshot opponents 72-59 and outscored them 9-6.

Stutzle has also been the catalyst for the second-best power play in the league at 42.9 per cent, notching six power-play points in nine games. Last season, Stutzle had just one power-play goal.

On both of Ottawa’s power plays against St. Louis in the second period, Stutzle was excellent. He positioned himself on his favourite left side where he had options to shoot and pass. Stutzle regularly made the right read, twice making passes on the left hashmarks when the Blues shaded over to attempt to thwart the Senators star. On both occasions, Stutzle's quick passes off the pressure allowed Tkachuk to be wide open in the slot, leading to two goals.  

With 14 points so far, Stutzle is on pace for 127 points, which may be a little far-fetched. But he could surpass the 100-point mark — a threshold for winning teams. Since the 2019-20 season, NHL players have hit the 100-point mark 30 times and only twice have their teams not made the playoffs. (One of them was the man who was exchanged for the draft pick that became Stutzle — Erik Karlsson).

If Stutzle maintains his level, the Senators’ pathway to the playoffs gets brighter and simpler.

Ullmark bounces back

Ullmark blamed himself for the loss against the Vegas Golden Knights on Friday, when he gave up five goals on 27 shots. But he credited a chat with his coach afterwards for his much-improved play against St. Louis.

“(I) had a very good talk with Travis afterwards, and I think what he said was that you're not as good as you think you are, and you're not as bad as you think you are," Ullmark said.

Ullmark was impeccable when needed, robbing Jordan Kyrou in the first period when the game was within St. Louis’ reach at 2-0 and then stoning Brayden Schenn with a glove save on the power play. Ullmark stopped 26 of 27 shots, while saving all six high-danger shots from the Blues, according to Natural Stat Trick.

Tidbits

Drake Batherson and Greig have been living with their sisters, Mae Batherson and Dara Greig, in Ottawa in anticipation of the PWHL season. Mae Batherson was drafted by Minnesota Frost and Dara Greig by Montreal Victoire. The women have become friends and were in attendance for the game against St. Louis. The pair have been training together with Ottawa Charge players ahead of the season.

Meanwhile, Jacob Bernard-Docker was asked if he ever checked his analytics, because his pairing alongside Tyler Kleven has been outchancing opponents 78-63 in their six games together. Bernard-Docker was surprised and didn’t know that the pairing had been analytically excellent with the best CORSI of any consistent pairing on the team. Bernard-Docker said he only checks the analytics when the coaches come to him with specifics of where they want to defend better.