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Returning from back surgery that cost him all but five games of the 2012-13 campaign was tougher than Jason Spezza figured.

Now, it appears, he's finally back to being the player and point producer that he's been his whole career. Now he has a winger with whom he clicks. Now he's fully equipped to lead the Senators as they try to work their way back into the playoff picture.

"I think I'm moving better," Spezza said after Tuesday's practice at Canadian Tire Centre. "At the start of the year I don't think I was as sharp as maybe I've been in the past, because I missed a full season.

"As much as I wanted to tell myself I was going to hop back on to the highway at full speed, it maybe took me 15-20 games to get back to that game pace. I've felt better about my game for the last couple of months, and I'm starting to get rewarded offensively for it."

The numbers being racked up of late by the 30-year old captain are more in line with what we've come to expect. In the past two games, Spezza has six points - three assists in Saturday's 5-3 victory over the Winnipeg Jets and a goal (to cap an inspiring comeback with 1:07 left in the third) plus two assists in Monday's 4-3 overtime loss to the Nashville Predators. (He would have had a third helper in the Predators game had Pekka Rinne not made a miraculous glove save off Erik Karlsson.)

Spezza now has 14 points in his last nine games to give him 53 (including 17 goals) and move into second place on the team scoring list (five points behind Karlsson) as well as 29th (before Tuesday's games) among league leaders. The surge has also pushed him back to over a point-a-game clip (674 in 671) in this, his 11th season.

Part of it, of course, has to do with the arrival of Ales Hemsky, the veteran winger GM Bryan Murray finally secured as a linemate for Spezza. Hemsky went pointless in his first game as a Senator, but since then has six assists in the last two games.

Right now, he's making Murray looking pretty shrewd, as he has been the most productive of any player moved at the deadine.

"He's played very well for us," said Spezza. "He's got great hockey sense. He works hard away from the puck to get himself open. I'm sure it's nice for him to come to a new team and have success early.

"I think I knew his game pretty well. I know a few guys on Edmonton, I've watched them play for awhile and they're on (TV) after our games so you end up watching those games quite a bit.

"We're the same age. We grew up (together) "¦ the world juniors "¦ I've played against him at all different levels, so I felt like I knew his game pretty well, which probably helped with the chemistry."

Spezza, who this season has had more wingers than Tim McGraw has cowboy hats, did experience some self-confidence issues earlier on.

"I don't think I doubted myself as a player, but you doubt how you're playing and you try to find your way around what you're doing wrong," said Spezza. "Sometimes it becomes difficult to identify what you're getting away from and why you're not having success.

"I think in my career I've been able to identify things that I'm not doing well and that's why I've been able to be pretty consistent. I think there was a period this year where I was a little bit lost in my game, and I was probably trying to do too much of other things and not enough of what I do well.

"For me it's a matter of grabbing the puck and hanging on to it, being strong on it. I think that's what I kind of got away from for a little bit. I think I was trying to play a little bit too in the middle, and not hang on to the puck as much as I normally do."

While some may think the trade rumours that included his name have also lit a fire under him, Spezza says they had no affect whatsoever. Nor has the notion that, with just one more season on his contract, his longer term future could see him moved if the team fails in his first year wearing the 'C'.

"I've thought about getting us into the playoffs here in the next 15 games and that's it," he said. "We're in desperation mode and you can't let your mind wander on to anything else."

That desperation mode was evident in the third period Monday, as the Senators scored three times to erase a 3-0 deficit and salvage a point. But where was it at the start of the game? At this point, they need to be playing every minute like it could be their last.

"Someone in (the dressing room) said we have a third period here, if we don't throw everything at it, it could be a huge hill for us to climb," Spezza said of conversations that took place during the second intermission. "This is time to show desperation. We thought we were going to do that before the game, and we had two periods where "¦ I don't know if it was lack of desperation. I don't think our effort lacked in the first two periods, our execution did. They played really well, the outplayed us.

"It was good to see the urgency of the group in the third, because it shows we believe we have a chance to make the playoffs."

Ottawa Senators' Jason Spezza has 14 points in last nine games as Sens push for playoff spot

Returning from back surgery that cost him all but five games of the 2012-13 campaign was tougher than Jason Spezza figured.

Now, it appears, he's finally back to being the player and point producer that he's been his whole career. Now he has a winger with whom he clicks. Now he's fully equipped to lead the Senators as they try to work their way back into the playoff picture.

"I think I'm moving better," Spezza said after Tuesday's practice at Canadian Tire Centre. "At the start of the year I don't think I was as sharp as maybe I've been in the past, because I missed a full season."