Kukla's Korner Hockey

Kukla's Korner Hockey

What Will The Ottawa Senators Do With Mark Stone And Matt Duchene?

01/30/2019 at 6:53pm EST

from Bruce Garrioch of the Pttawa Sun,

The top priority for the Senators is to keep Stone in the fold, and it’s believed both sides are optimistic that will be the case. The 26-year-old agreed to a one-year, $7.35 million contract last August to avoid arbitration and the talks have been centred around an eight-year agreement upwards of $8 million per season.

The Senators and Stone weren’t really that far apart on a contract when they agreed to avoid arbitration. The sense then was that when the two sides sat down in January they would be able to bridge the gap between them. Stone has performed up to expectations and has done a good job leading the way for the young players.

Of course, this leads us to Duchene. You can’t question his commitment to the decision by the organization to go young and he’s done his part with this group. But he came to Ottawa because he wanted to be part of a contender and nobody could have predicted that, three months after the deal in November 2017, the organization would rebuild.

The Senators have been forthcoming with Duchene — and Stone, for that matter — about the plan. The Senators want their top two forwards to be the centre pieces for this rebuild and then they hope to get the right young players around them so this team gets back to being a contender.

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Paul Kukla founded Kukla’s Korner in 2005 and the site has since become the must-read site on the ‘net for all the latest happenings around the NHL.

From breaking news to in-depth stories around the league, KK Hockey is updated with fresh stories all day long and will bring you the latest news as quickly as possible.

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