In their greatest moments, athletes are often at their most humble.
So it was with Craig Anderson when he returned to Ottawa on Tuesday to sign a “one-day contract” and officially retire as an Ottawa Senator. Cue the salary-cap room jokes.
The Senators’ steadiest and most reliable goaltender – elevating himself to elite levels in the playoffs – Anderson was humble, grateful, thoughtful and gracious as he reflected on his nine years with the Senators (2011-20).
And thankful to have played in a Canadian market.
“You light up the dreams of so many kids when you live in this town,” said Anderson, whose family continues to reside in Florida.
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Anderson’s own sons, Jake and Levi, with their mother, Nicholle, helped Anderson celebrate his return to Ottawa by dropping a rare ceremonial faceoff between two goalies – Anton Forsberg of the Senators and Buffalo’s Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen.
Both teams could lay claim to Anderson, who finished his playing career with the Sabres last season, and watched intently as a video tribute to Anderson rolled on the scoreboard screen.
“Andy! Andy!” fans chanted as Anderson saluted the crowd at the Canadian Tire Centre, one that he ignited more than once by his standout play.
At his news conference earlier in the day, Anderson recalled that day in February of 2011 when he got the news he had just been acquired by Senators general manager Bryan Murray in a deal with the Colorado Avalanche.
“I was arguably the worst player in the league,” Anderson laughs, about his 13-15 record and 3.28 goals-against average for Colorado at the time. Hardly the worst numbers, but a sharp dropoff from the 25-win season with the Avs the year before when Anderson was working with a goalie coach he knew and respected.
In 2011, he found himself arguing with his goalie coach and approaching his 30th birthday, wondering if his days in the league were numbered.
“I didn’t know if I was going to play another season, it was that bad,” Anderson said. “A fresh start was what I needed.”
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As it turned out, Anderson and the Sens needed each other. Badly. Murray had watched Brian Elliott struggle that season and Pascal Leclaire experience one calamity after another.
We would tease Murray later that the trade for Anderson probably saved the GM his job.
Murray’s successor, Pierre Dorion, Murray’s understudy at the time, says now that after Anderson’s very first game, a Feb. 19, 1-0 shootout victory in Toronto in which Anderson stopped 47 Leafs shots, Murray said to Dorion “we’ve got our guy.”
They sure did.
Even though the Senators missed the playoffs that season, Anderson’s 11-5-1 record, with a 2.05 GAA stabilized the franchise and signaled better days ahead.
Not glory days like the 2007 run to the Stanley Cup Final, but at least playoff appearances in 2012, ‘13, ‘15 and in 2017 that brilliant stretch to Game 7 of the Eastern Conference Final.
Anderson always rose to the playoff occasion, posting a 24-23-0 record in 46 games played with a 2.35 GAA and .929 career save percentage.
“Playoffs were a different animal,” Anderson says. “There was always more on the line . . . and I just wanted to be there for the guys. I didn’t want to be the reason we lost in those moments. I took pride in that.
“The stats are the stats . . . but we as a group would buckle down in the playoffs. Those numbers are indicative of the players playing in front of me.”
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In club history, Anderson played the most games of any Ottawa goaltender, 435. He finished with a 202-168-46 record, a 2.84 goals-against mark and .914 save percentage.
Sterling stats.
Anderson got better with age, mostly because of the mental side of goaltending, he says.
Between those biggest games, Anderson always looked like the coolest cat in the Senators’ room. He says in hindsight that the room was a “happy place” for him here, with veterans like Daniel Alfredsson, Chris Phillips and Chris Neil to lean on and show the way. All three Sens alumni were in the media conference room on Tuesday and all three were credited by Anderson for pushing him to be better. During the first period of the game, Phillips and Neil presented Anderson with a Senators alumni jacket.
His favourite moment as a Senator?
Though he thought of a few, right up there was the night he returned to the Sens lineup in Edmonton after leaving the club to support his wife, Nicolle, then being treated for cancer.
Anderson shut out the Oilers 2-0 in late October of 2016, an emotional moment for the goalie, the entire franchise and fans. Anderson would win the Masterton Trophy in 2017.
“Personally, the big one was in Edmonton,” Anderson says. “Again, we talked about the camaraderie in 2011 when I first joined the team, the camaraderie around Nicholle’s cancer and me being away and coming back – the camaraderie around Clarke MacArthur going through his injuries – those are the moments you remember.
“When Clarke scored the OT winner in Boston (in 2017, eliminating the Bruins), those are the moments you remember. That had nothing to do with me, that was a team thing. That’s where guys could rally around each other and that’s what this team was about for my 10 years here.”
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Anderson grew emotional when he spoke about being able to go out on his own terms, and “calling his own shot” with this one-day Ottawa contract.
“I didn’t announce a retirement, because I wanted to be a Senator again,” Anderson says, ironically stepping into a new job with the rival Sabres as a mentor.
Dorion, though, said that there will always be a place for Anderson with the Senators organization down the road.
“I never wanted to leave,” Anderson said, of not being renewed after the 2019-20 season in Ottawa. “I felt that this place was home for me and my family. To be here today (Anderson’s voice trails off as he gathers himself) . . . there’s no certainties in life. To be here today, to be able to end this way, it’s a storybook ending.”
Anderson termed his final three seasons, as a mostly practice goalie with the Washington Capitals and then two years with the Sabres, as a way of giving back to the game. And to grow as a person.
“Being on the taxi squad in Washington was a turning point for me as in – how can I be helpful to the guys, how can I be a better teammate? The biggest thing I learned was being the bigger person, the better teammate.
“I think that sometimes gets lost. When you’re fighting for contracts, fighting for playoffs, you get a ‘me’ attitude, as opposed to a ‘we’ attitude. And I think my last three years really kind of solidified that ‘we’ moment.”
Anderson’s final game on April 13, 2023 was picture perfect, right down to the opponent – Ottawa.
He hadn’t played for more than three weeks, but reached back for one of those classic Andy games, where he was always in the right place, always anticipating the puck. And he beat his old Senators 4-3 in overtime.
As well as Anderson played, the 41-year-old knew that night he was done.
“The moment I knew it was over for me was when Brady Tkachuk came up to me and goes, ‘hey, are you gonna play another season?’
“My body was cramping in mid-game. And I go, ‘Brady, this is it. I can’t get up!’
“I think he asked me in the first period, but in the second period I made a save on my back and my legs cramped up and I was kind of stuck. I just couldn’t get up real quick, and I knew it was time.”
Tuesday night, it was time to say thanks to a Senators mainstay.
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