The team turned their play around to place second in the division and won three playoff series to make it to the Stanley Cup Finals, the first in Ottawa in 80 years.
The line of Daniel Alfredsson, Jason Spezza and Dany Heatley would lead the way with impressive offensive totals.
A short time later, they traded star forward Martin Havlat and centre Bryan Smolinski to the Chicago Blackhawks for Tom Preissing, Josh Hennessy, Michal Barinka and a second-round draft pick in 2008.
They also signed blueliner Jamie Allison and re-signed Antoine Vermette, Chris Neil and Peter Schaefer to avoid arbitration proceedings.
In addition, Ottawa re-signed Chris Kelly and Jason Spezza to two-year contracts each, as well as Christoph Schubert.
Wade Redden was ultimately the choice over Zdeno Chara based on his impressive past couple of seasons.
Redden's salary made him the highest paid player on the team and the media and fans expected another top-notch season.
On January 3, 2007, Ottawa acquired centre Mike Comrie from the Phoenix Coyotes in exchange for prospect Alexei Kaigorodov.
Although the referees ruled it was a legal hit (and replays and analysts concurred after the game), a fight ensued after play restarted.
Midway through the season, the Senators acquired centre Mike Comrie and left wing Oleg Saprykin from the Phoenix Coyotes.
The defence pairing of Chris Phillips and Anton Volchenkov won praise from the media for their "shutdown effectiveness" against opposing top lines.
[5] The 'CASH line' of Spezza, Heatley, and Alfredsson was outstanding offensively, scoring nearly half of the Senators' goals in the post-season, appearing on The Hockey News cover for their play.