Hypothetical situation:
A 26-year-old goalie follows up a lengthy playoff run with an injury-thwarted off-year and loses his starting job and is available on the free agent market. Looking back over the years there are plenty of goalies who broke through and stood on their heads in one playoff year only to struggle the next regular season: J.S. Giguere after the Ducks' run in 2003, Khabibulin after 2004, Cam Ward and Dwayne Roloson after their showings in '06, and even Jose Theodore after his Hart Trophy season.
After a lengthy playoff run, goalies, entire teams for that matter, have a hard time putting themselves back on track. The Senators seemed to have broken that pattern last fall but for one reason or another the team unraveled in a manner that will leave the hockey detectives scratching their heads for years as they try to figure out what happened.
The most popular theory going around will be "It was Ray Emery's fault." Emery does indeed have attitude and maturity issues if he isn't a complete headcase, but it was something the Sens were riding with and thriving on during the the first half of 2007.
Odds are, Emery will be back in the NHL in a back-up capacity in 2009-10 after a decent bounce-back season in Russia that proves he can be steady in the net and more importantly the highway and dressing room. The Sens will tweak rather than blow-up and rebuild and fail to recapture their Fall 2007 performance.
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