The narrative began with one of the first questions Guy Boucher was asked at the beginning of the Stanley Cup playoffs, and it's followed the Senators through two rounds.
"I never pushed it," Boucher, Ottawa's coach, replied to a reporter at his team's media availability Friday evening at the Fairmont hotel, Downtown. "I never came up and said, ‘Hey, we’re the underdogs.’ "
But Boucher also appears to understand why most of the hockey world has labeled them underdogs by picking the Penguins to prevail in the Eastern Conference final, even after the Senators ousted the Bruins and Rangers in six games each.
"If you’re asking me if this is a tough opponent, it doesn’t take a rocket scientist to tell you," Boucher continued. "This is the Stanley Cup champions who just eliminated the No. 1 team in the league. … I think this is the best team in the NHL, so we have to measure up to the best in the NHL."
The Senators, who had the sixth-best regular-season record in the East, embraced the label of underdog through their first 12 playoff games, but Erik Karlsson said that should have been shed once they advanced to the conference final for the first time since 2007.
Adopting Boucher's 1-3-1 defensive system that forces mistakes in the neutral zone, the Senators have proven to be resilient. Forty of their 82 regular-season games were decided by one goal and they won 21 of those. That trend has continued in the playoffs, with the Senators 7-2 in one-goal games through two rounds.
Kyle Turris scored the overtime goal to send the Senators to a 5-4 win over the Rangers in Game 5 last Saturday. Jean-Gabriel Pageau did the same in Game 2 and Karlsson, who has 13 points in the playoffs and is averaging 28:56 per game, scored the game-winner with less than five minutes remaining in Game 1.
As Mark Stone explained, the Senators have players up and down the roster contributing in key moments:
