What does the future hold for Steve Staios and the Ottawa Senators?

Tyler Yaremchuk was joined by Frank Seravalli to discuss Steve Staios’ future in Ottawa on the latest episode of Daily Faceoff Live.

Tyler Yaremchuk: Steve Staios slides in as the interim general manager, is there a chance this is more than just the interim tag? Maybe we see the old Kyle Dubas move where Staios hires himself to be the GM full time?

Frank Seravalli: I wouldn’t be surprised to see that just because of the way he answered the question when asked about the GM search. He didn’t sound like someone who was running to the phone directory for the NHL to try and set up interviews. He seemed like someone who said I’m now going to look after both day-to-day and the long-term view for the Ottawa Senators. And seemed kind of comfortable in this spot and there’s no doubt that Michael Andlauer is comfortable with him in this spot because he was the president and GM of the Hamilton Bulldogs when Andlauer owned that team.

They won two OHL championships together. So he clearly believes that Steve Staios is capable of holding this role even though he said he liked the two-headed monster of having both a GM and a president of hockey operations. I wouldn’t be surprised to see him keep it for the next little while and then at some point just remove the interim tag, but I could also see them going through a process.

Tyler Yaremchuk: Yeah, it doesn’t seem like they need to be in any sort of rush, I guess it’s very similar to the Kyle Dubas situation in Pittsburgh. You’re in capable hands right now, it’s not like there’s no one leading the ship here. Staios can do it and I like the connection you made the Andlauer, you remember his time with the Canadiens. They have that two-pronged approach Jeff Gorton and Kent Hughes.

Frank Seravalli: There seemed to be a lot of talk about Peter Chiarelli and the potential of him joining the Sens, as you know he’s the senior VP of the St. Louis Blues and former Edmonton Oilers GM in addition to the Boston Bruins. And he has deep connections to Ottawa, I’m not saying that they won’t talk to Peter Chiarelli at some point or even that they haven’t already. But less than one month ago at the board of governors meeting, we asked Michael Andlauer about the name floating out there in Peter Chiarelli and he said that Chiarelli had contacted him, he’s open to conversations but at that point they hadn’t even had the chance to meet up.

So maybe that will happen but it’s not anywhere near down the track as some on social media would seem to think it was.

You can watch the rest of the episode here: