Senators head coach Travis Green doesn’t often go out of his way to praise specific players, so when he was asked who stuck out to him on the first day of training camp on Thursday, it was telling that he landed on 38-year-old Claude Giroux.
Green even said that Giroux — who is the ninth-oldest active player under contract in the NHL — “looked like he was 25 again.”
And while Giroux’s age might make him an outlier in the Senators’ dressing room (the next oldest players at camp are Ben Hutton, Nick Cousins, and Linus Ullmark, who are all 33), his role on the team remains important, as he enters his fifth season in his adopted home of Ottawa.
On Sunday, as the Senators practiced special teams for the first time since opening camp, Giroux remained a mainstay on the second power play unit alongside Thomas Chabot and Shane Pinto. Rotating in were the duos of Carter Yakemchuk and Andre Burakovsky, and then Fabian Zetterlund and Stephen Halliday. Giroux later took penalty kill reps as well.
“I think just working on the basics today, making sure that everybody knows their position, knows what kind of plays we want to be looking for, but it was a good first day for the power play and the PK,” said Giroux.
Halliday, whose long, flowing, red locks poking out under his helmet bring back memories of a younger Giroux, has enjoyed playing with the veteran of over 1300 NHL games during the first few days of training camp.
“Like Greener said in his press conference, he was flying around the first day. Can't tell [his age] at all. He's still giving guys the gears and stuff too,” said the 24-year-old on Saturday. Halliday added he works hard in order to not fall behind Giroux in any drills.
“I don't want to be last to ‘G’ in anything. He’s still got it pretty good, especially on face-offs, so yeah, it's super motivating seeing the guy still works on his game a lot, and just seeing the training that he did this summer — he's been in the league for 20 years, has however many points he has in the game, so yeah, it's definitely a motivator.”
The third member of their line over the first three days of training camp, Tyler Boucher, did not skate with the main group on Sunday as the team prepares to send an NHL-heavy roster to Trois-Rivières for their first preseason game.
Still, Giroux has enjoyed the opportunity to play with the 23-year-old, who he has known since he went over to the Bouchers’ for dinners when Tyler was a kid.
“His dad [Brian] was my stallmate for a few years, and we got along very well. He's a funny guy, and spent a lot of time with his dad, so to play with him was pretty cool,” said Giroux on Sunday.
“That’s a long time ago, but it’s pretty cool we’re in the same organization now.”
