Talk:Ottawa Senators (original)/GA1

GA Review

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This article has been waiting a long time for a review, so I'll give it a shot. With that said, it's pretty long, so I'll review a section or two at a time. Please feel free to respond to my comments and/or address them by editing the article at any time. You don't need to wait until I'm finished reviewing the whole thing. When I finish reviewing the last section, I will place the nomination on hold to allow for everything to be addressed and/or discussed. The normal hold time is seven days, but I can be flexible as long as progress is being made. And so, without further ado, the beginning of the review...

Lead

an amateur, later professional, senior men's ice hockey team" - the phrasing of "amateur, later professional" is awkward, and only hockey fans would understand what is mean by "senior men's".
"The Club had several..." - capitalizing "club" seems unnecessary, and it is inconsistent with later in the article.
The list of nicknames implies that there were several years in between with no nickname. Is that the case?
"Generally acknowledged by hockey historians as one of the greatest teams..." - this might be a case of weasel words. I'll come back to this later after reading more of the article. The sentence also seems to have two distinct thoughts and might be better split in two (at any rate, the punctuation needs to be changed or a word needs to be added, as it currently reads as two sentences joined with a comma).
"Ottawa HC" - can this be included in the parentheses in the first sentence: "(officially the Ottawa Hockey Club, or Ottawa HC)" or explained in the second mention: "during the period of 1903 to 1927, the Ottawa Hockey Club (Ottawa HC) played in..."?
It seems strange to contrast the Hall of Fame recognizing them as 11-time champions with the NHL recognizing them as 11-time champions. Perhaps this will become clear as I read through the article.
The lead is quite short for an article of this length. According to Wikipedia:Lead section#Length, three or four paragraphs is recommended.

Early amateur era (1883–1902)

"Nelson Porter is recorded as the scorer of the club's first goal, at the 1884 Carnival" - first goal in the team's history or first goal at the carnival? If it's the first at the carnival, no comma is needed.

Formation of the AHAC

Is the end of the first paragraph covered by the reference in the next paragraph? I generally like to have references at least at the end of each paragraph.
Is there any record of how the club did in the 1887 challenge?

OHA Championships

"...P. D. Ross, would be a trustee..." - could we say "...P. D. Ross, became a trustee..." to avoid the conditional verb tense?
Again, is the information at the end of the first paragraph covered by the citation in the next paragraph?

Silver Seven era (1903–1906)

There are a couple of point of view issues in the first paragaph: the "possibly the most famous" (unless a source can be cited), and the "shellacking".
Is the information at the end of the first paragraph covered by a source?

Style of play

It sounds strange to refer to the team as "the Ottawas". Unless they are referred to that way in your sources, perhaps just "Ottawa" would work better.

Dawson City challenge

"perhaps the most famous Stanley Cup challenge of all" - this is a point of view statement
"catch a steamer to Vancouver" - Vancouver, British Columbia or Vancouver, Washington? A wikilink would help.
"The first game started well for Dawson, being only down 3–1 at the half, but things turned ugly afterwards." - this is point of view in both "started well" and "turned ugly"

Stanley Cup Challenge win streak

Some prose to briefly introduce this section would help.
Are references available for the two paragraphs in this section? For the second paragraph, only the information about Jim McGee really needs a citation.

Transition to professional

"cracked his stick across Ernie Johnson's nose, breaking it" - it should be more clear that "it" refers to Johnson's nose (at least, I assume it does).
"Taylor was hired away from the IHL for the 1908 season at $1000 and a guaranteed federal civil service job" - the $1000 is an annual salary rather than a lump sum payment, right? This isn't clear in the prose.
"leaving only Ottawa, Quebec, Wanderers and Shamrocks" - for parallel structure, it would probably work best to have the home cities listed rather than the cities for some and the team names for others.

National Hockey Association

"O'Brien instead decided to form the NHA, and found the Montreal Canadiens" - I believe this should be "founded", not "found".
It is confusing to have the seasons referred to inconsistently (eg. "The 1910 season" vs. "The 1911-12 season").
Reference 53 has no page number.
Is a reference available for the 1915-16 season?
Wikilinks to places like Galt and Port Arthur would help, if articles exist.

Champions in 1906 and 1910? Historians' debate

I'm not convinced that this is an encyclopedic section header
Is the information in the first paragraph already referenced in this article? Most of it seems familiar, but I'm not sure if it has all been sourced already.

NHL Years (1917–1934)

"The schedule was abbreviated by the demise of the Arenas" - who? If this is another team, I'm not sure "demise" sounds encyclopedic.

The 'Super Six' (1920–1927)

Is a reference available for the information in the first paragraph (particularly the club causing the NHL to change the rule, but a reference for the trade would also help)
"the Quebec Bulldogs returned" - to the NHL, or to another league from the NHL?
"artificial ice" - I don't know that this needs to be explained in the article, but I would love to know what artificial ice is. I always assumed that freezing water was the simplest way to cover a rink.
Are references available for Clancy playing all positions or the seating capacity of the arena (the reference for Clancy is the more important of the two)?
Is a reference available for Benedict's drinking and trade?
Was the Lady Byng Trophy awarded for sportsmanship at this time?

Decline (1927–34)

"The team fell into last place for the first time since 1898" - what season is this describing?
"club president Ahearn" - president of Ottawa or New York?

1934: End of the first NHL era in Ottawa

It seems awkward to have the "See the article" tags in the middle of the prose. Could they be worked into the sentences (ie. "The city of Ottawa did not have an NHL franchise again until the 1992–93 season, when the new Ottawa Senators joined the league as an expansion team.")?

Logos and jerseys

It would be helpful to have references included for the "barber pole" design (especially the "synonymous" part) and the 67s uniforms.

Ownership

"clearly planning to derail Livingstone's plans" - this doesn't sound encyclopedic. The "clearly planning" makes it sound more like speculation (although I agree that it sounds likely). I'm also confused as to who Livingstone is.
"Quinn would get further action from the NHL" - this sounds awkward. It's written in the conditional tense ("Quinn got further..." is correct), but "got further action" sounds awkward as well. Can a different verb be used?
The information for 1929 to 1931 is uncited.

Fans

Just a minor detail, but "quite wet" is repeated.
It would be good to have a citation for Johnson receiving the hat.
Was there any significance to the lemons? Were they chosen for a reason? I'm not convinced that such information exists, but it would be interesting if it did.

List of Stanley Cup final appearances

This needs a bit of organizational work. I'm not sure if a table would help, but at the very least, a few things need to be considered: (1) after the year, is a spaced hyphen, unspaced hyphen, or en dash going to be used? (2) when Ottawa wins and the losing team has a name (eg. Vancouver Maroons), will it be "Ottawa defeats the" or "Ottawa defeats"? (3) when Ottawa loses and the winning team has a name, will it be "Montreal wanderers defeats" or "Montreal Wanderers defeat"? - my preference is "defeat" (4) is there a comma before the dates the games were played? (5) the 1904 results are confusing: (5–5– Montreal loses by default). This is explained in the "Stanley Cup Challenge win streak" section, but you should remember that some readers will just scroll down to the list at the bottom for quick information.

References

Some of the online references are missing publishers or access dates.
26 should be "SportsEcyclopedia.com", not "SportEcyclopedia.com"

Images

Information is missing for the Image:Ottawa Senators, 1914-1915.jpg picture. In addition, it is the only image that refers to the team as "Ottawa HC" instead of "Ottawa Hockey Club".

Team captains

Is there a source that lists them all? Currently, only two have references.

And so ends the initial review. I see that you've already addressed some of these, so I will go back and see which ones have ben completed. I will place this nomination on hold now to allow for these concerns to be addressed and/or discussed. Thank you for your patience with the review. GaryColemanFan (talk) 15:25, 30 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

First off, thanks for accepting the review. I think this way of taking it piece by piece is a good idea. I will work on your points. Of course, some of the lead is explained in the body, (one of the greatest, e.g. is explained by NHL first dynasty, and being voted team of the first half of the 20th century) The HHOF and NHL point is also addressed in the article. It is due to the nature of the awarding of the trophy in the times. Alaney2k (talk) 13:46, 24 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Second review
I am going over the article again (currently to the beginning of the NHL years) to ensure that all of my concerns have been addressed and that nothing was missed. The article is very close, but a few things have come up:

~~In the "Re-entry into the AHAC" section, can a reference be provided for the first paragraph, and which team was "previously undefeated"?~~
~~Which Montreal team did Ottawa play in 1893-94?~~
~~Can a reference be provided for the information about McGee in the first paragraph of the "Silver Seven era" section?~~
~~"perhaps the most famous Stanley Cup challenge of all" in the "Dawson Cup Challenge" section is a point of view statement.~~
~~From the third paragraph of the "Stanley Cup champions in 1906 and 1910: Historians' debate" section: "However, they gave up the Cup to the Montreal Wanderers" - who are "they"?~~
Is a reference available for the information in the first paragraph of the "Super Six" section (particularly the club causing the NHL to change the rule, but a reference for the trade would also help)?
~~Is a reference available for Clancy playing all positions in 1923?~~

I should have this finished soon. GaryColemanFan (talk) 20:52, 3 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Comment - The Dawson City challenge is very famous in hockey history. What is a more appropriate wording for this? Or are you looking for a media quote/cite for that? Alaney2k (talk) 23:18, 3 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

If you could provide a reference, that should work (especially if you can include a quotation in the reference template). GaryColemanFan (talk) 00:00, 4 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Done. Alaney2k (talk) 01:17, 4 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I went through the rest of the article, and everything looked good. I did some copyediting and added a reference, but there was nothing major. The article now meets all six GA requirements, so I am promoting it. Thank you for your patience, quick responses, and hard work. You should be very proud of this article. GaryColemanFan (talk) 03:03, 4 November 2008 (UTC)[reply]