Senators general manager Pierre Dorion said Thursday the team intends to keep pending unrestricted free agent Mark Borowiecki in Ottawa for the remainder of his career.

"We hope to make Mark Borowiecki a Senator for life," Dorion told TSN Radio 1200 Ottawa, noting discussions have begun with the defenceman's agents.

Pierre Dorion "we hope to make Mark Borowiecki a Senator for life" — TSN 1200 (@TSN1200) February 27, 2020

Borowiecki has a career-high seven goals and 18 points in 53 games this season. He has been sidelined since Feb. 13 with a torn ligament in his ankle, though Dorion said Monday he informed the 30-year-old several months earlier that he wouldn't be moved at the trade deadline.

“I told Mark Borowiecki sometime in December he wasn’t going to be traded,” Dorion said, per the Ottawa Sun. “There’s got to be a human side to how we do our business here and everyone here knows that Mark and his wife were expecting their first child.

“To get the return that we probably would have gotten wasn’t worth it. We wanted Mark to be here until the end of the year and possibly talk contract negotiations moving forward because we really like what he brings to our team and how he shows our younger kids how to play and how he practises hard every day and those are key elements for us in the rebuild.”

A fifth-round pick of the Senators in 2008, Borowiecki has spent his entire career with the team, posting 15 goals and 51 points in 375 NHL games.