OTTAWA — After his strong opening-round performance against the Boston Bruins, Derick Brassard is doing everything he can to deflect attention away from his individual matchup with Mika Zibanejad in the second round.
Good luck with that.
“It’s not about me and Mika,” Brassard, the Ottawa Senators centre, insisted following Wednesday’s practice in preparation for Game 1 Thursday against former Senator Zibanejad and the New York Rangers.
“Yeah, we did have the trade last summer, but there are other guys on the teams, it’s about the other 23 guys on both rosters.”
New conflicts will develop as the series rolls along — they always do — but off the top, the marquee matchup centres around the organizational shift that prompted the July 2016 swap.