From time to time over the summer, we like to head for the library to look back on some memorable moments in Ottawa Senators history, just waiting there to relive in The Hockey News Archive. The archive is free to all THN subscribers, and you can subscribe here.
Last season, it was great to see Dany Heatley be welcomed back into the Senators family for a reunion of The Pizza Line. It's hard to believe it's already been 20 years since they were formed. Back in December of 2025, Mike Brophy wrote a great piece on the 24-year-old Heatley, including his first few weeks in Ottawa, his comeback from the accident, and the incredible start on what might have been the best team in Sens history.
A fascinating read from our Dec 13, 2005/Vol. 59, Issue 13:
Turning Point
By Mike Brophy
Dany Heatley spots a friendly face on the other side of the visitor’s dressing room at Toronto’s Air Canada Centre and motions for the reporter to wander over.
As Mark Brender, senior writer for The Hockey News, draws near Heatley, the big left winger offers the now familiar dentally challenged smile and says, “Thirty-five?! Whoa!”
Heatley is referring to his rank in The Hockey News’ annual ‘Top 50’ list of NHL players in our 2005-06 Yearbook. It’s quite a drop from his No. 5 position of a year earlier. Brender, who can handle himself with the toughest opponents, rolls with Heatley’s jabs.
Reminded later of the encounter, Heatley laughs and says, “I was only kidding. I wasn’t really upset.”
For a young man who has been to hell and back, not much upsets Heatley these days. He’s playing on the top line on the NHL’s top team, along with Jason Spezza and Daniel Alfredsson. And, with points in all 22 of Ottawa’s games this season, he was one away from tying Wayne Gretzky’s mark for points in consecutive games from the start of the season with a new team. Gretzky had points in his first 23 games with the Los Angeles Kings in 1988-89.
Gretzky also holds the NHL record for longest point streak ever, 51 straight games with the Oilers in 1983-84. He managed 61 goals and 153 points in that span.
Heatley, 24, insists he doesn’t dwell on his own streak.
“It’s not a distraction for me,” he says. “I’m just trying to go out and play with those two guys and make things happen. The key for us is, if we are skating and moving the puck, good things will happen. The record (51 games) is so far away, it’s not even worth talking about.”
And if his head happens to get a little too big because of the streak, there’s always coach Bryan Murray to reel him in. In mid-November, Murray was concerned Heatley’s play was starting to slip. So, following an effort that left Murray wanting more, he walked past Heatley in the dressing room and grunted: “Is that (expletive) streak over with yet?”
Replied Heatley: “No. I got a point on a power play goal.”
“Are you sure?
“Yes.”
“We’ll let’s get it over with. You’ve got to play better. Dany, you’re stickhandling all the time. What the hell is that all about?”
Murray made his point.
“After that he got right back to playing the way he had been from the start of the year,” the coach says. “And he has been a star since.”
The Dany Heatley story has been told and retold ad nauseam. The Reader’s Digest version goes something like this: young hockey star with untold riches buys sports car, then crashes sports car while racing through a city street. He’s seriously injured and his passenger, teammate and friend, Dan Snyder, is killed. Snyder’s family offers Heatley support and helps him avoid jail time. Heatley resumes his career only to suffer an eye injury while playing in Europe during the NHL lockout. His play deteriorates. This past summer, seeking a change of scenery, he asks to be traded.
Sadly, this storyline will always be a part of his life. But the time has come to concentrate on the new chapters he is writing. His trade from Atlanta to Ottawa – in exchange for right winger Marian Hossa and defenseman Greg de Vries – was the first step toward a fresh start. Heatley is in a bona fide hockey market, he is healthy and he is thriving.
After a year in which he was called out for sub-par performances during the World Cup, World Championship and while playing in Europe, some wondered if the toll of what happened was too much for him to handle. Not Heatley, though.
Ask him if he is back and his response is quick and blunt.
“Back?” he says with a chuckle. “I was never gone.
“The lockout was a year off for everybody. I consider myself an NHL hockey player and there was no NHL hockey. I was anxious to get back to playing in this league and I’m happy to be back.”
Heatley defends himself when asked to explain his play at the World Championship and World Cup.
“Those two tournaments, in my opinion, are short-term events and the bottom line is, we won the World Cup,” he says. “I mean, I was not burying a bunch of goals, and that’s what I do, but sometimes it just doesn’t go in for you in a short tournament like that. Same thing with the worlds. I had a couple of good tournaments the two years before that and again, because in the last one I didn’t score nine or 10 goals, all of a sudden I’m no good?”
There were rumors in the hockey world that Heatley’s play was affected by alcohol consumption. Heatley denies it was ever a problem, saying, “I think it was a misconception. The people that know me, know me.”
Murray says he, too, heard the rumors. But after making a few calls to people who know Heatley well, the Sens coach was assured it was not an issue. Murray talked with Heatley prior to the season and told him Ottawa was a fishbowl because of the Senators’ popularity. Heatley assured his new coach he simply wanted to be the best player he could be.
“He worked hard at training camp, got in shape right off the bat and he has been successful,” Murray says.
Heatley loves his new surroundings. He lives in nearby Kanata, where the team plays, and feels the move has been good for him. An avid music fan, Heatley has attended U2 and Pearl Jam concerts at the Corel Centre and would love to go to Toronto to see his favorites, the Dave Matthews Band, in early December, but doesn’t think the team’s schedule will allow for it.
If anyone doubted whether he would return to the level of his first three NHL seasons, when he scored 80 goals and 181 points in 190 games and was the NHL’s top rookie in 2001-02, they need wonder no longer. Heatley was fifth in scoring with 17 goals and 38 points in 22 games (a 63-goal, 142-point pace). Linemates Spezza and Alfredsson were 1-2 in league scoring and the trio was on pace for 179 goals and 444 points.
The record is so far away, it’s not even worth talking about.
Dany Heatley on catching Gretzky’s record 51-game point streak
Murray originally intended to keep Alfredsson on a different line to spread the scoring around. But when rookie Brandon Bochenski needed more development time, Alfredsson was bumped up to the top unit. It was like Ringo joining The Beatles: they have made sweet music ever since.
“I thought we could get away with putting Alfie with them from time to time late in games like we did in our season opener,” Murray says, “but eventually we felt that giving them a world-class player like Alfie would give the other two guys a boost.”
Alfredsson could not be more pleased.
“I was hoping to play with Dany from the moment I heard we traded for him,” Alfredsson says. “I know he’s a special player and I knew it would be a lot of fun, especially on offense. He plays with a lot of creativity and he does things on the ice that make life easy for me.”
Spezza and Heatley played at the 2000 World Junior Championship for Canada, but were not linemates. “Actually we did play on the same line during tryouts,” Spezza recalls. “That’s probably why I made the team.”
Spezza says the key to the line’s success is communication.
“We have great chemistry on the ice and we get along real well off the ice, too,” he says. “We have the type of relationship where, if he does something I don’t like or I do something he doesn’t like, we just tell each other and we don’t take it personally. You don’t offend the other guy by pointing out something that goes a long way toward us having on-ice success. We can have rifts during the game and get upset at each other and it’s really no big deal. It never carries over to off the ice.”
Alfredsson didn’t know quite what to expect in being teamed up with Heatley.
“I thought he was a great shooter and really skilled 1-on-1, but the biggest thing I have found is he can create something out of nothing. His vision on the ice is good.”
Atlanta GM Don Waddell, for his part, is not surprised at Heatley’s recent success.
“He’s a great hockey player,” Waddell says. “Whether he could have enjoyed that kind of success in Atlanta, that was the question. We knew a change of scenery would be beneficial to him and obviously going to a good hockey club has helped.”
For the first quarter of the season at least, Heatley had people in the hockey world checking game summaries each morning to see if his point streak was still alive. And the smile he wears is one of genuine happiness.
“I’m happy for simple reasons,” he says. “We’re back playing and practicing and doing the things I like to do. I love being back in the routine and hanging with the guys. I missed that last season with the lockout and half-a-season before that (after the accident). Hockey should be fun and it is. I’m liking what’s going on now.”
You don’t need to tell us, Dany. It shows.
Three forwards on the same team, all in the top five in NHL scoring? Here’s a look at trios to pull this trick since 1967.
BOSTON BRUINS
1970-71 Points
1. P. Esposito 152
2. B. Orr, Bos 139
3. J. Bucyk 116
4. K. Hodge 105
5. B. Hull, Chi 96
NEW YORK RANGERS
1971-72 Points
1. P. Esposito, Bos 133
2. B. Orr, Bos 117
3. J. Ratelle 109
4. V. Hadfield 106
5. R. Gilbert 97
BOSTON BRUINS
1973-74 Points
1. P. Esposito 145
2. B. Orr 122
3. K. Hodge 105
4. W. Cashman 89
5. B. Clarke, Phi 87
EDMONTON OILERS
1986-87 Points
1. W. Gretzky 183
2. J. Kurri 108
3. M. Lemieux, Pit 107
4. M. Messier 107
5. D. Gilmour, StL 105
PITTSBURGH PENGUINS
1995-96 Points
1. M. Lemieux 161
2. J. Jagr 149
3. J. Sakic, Col 120
4. R. Francis 119
5. P. Forsberg, Col 116
OTTAWA SENATORS
2005-06 Points
1. J. Spezza 41
2. D. Alfredsson 40
3. J. Jagr, NYR 39
4. P. Forsberg, Phi 39
5. D. Heatley 38 ■
By Mike Brophy
The Hockey News
Dec 13, 2005/Vol. 59, Issue 13
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