The Ottawa Senators have had a ridiculously light schedule the last couple weeks but things are about to get a whole lot busier.
And it starts with a weekend back to back. First up, the Arizona Coyotes are in town for an afternoon showdown. Then the Senators are right back at it tomorrow night at Madison Square Garden against the New York Rangers. From there, Ottawa will play 10 of 11 games on the road.
With that daunting schedule ahead, the Senators really could use these two points.
First of all, a big thank you to the Montreal Canadiens for handing the Coyotes their first regulation win of the season on Thursday night. Had Arizona come to town still looking for their first W, an Ottawa loss would have seemed inevitable. Now, it at least feels like the Senators have a chance.
This Arizona team is off to an absolutely dreadful start to their season, sitting comfortably in last place in the NHL . Their -32 goal differential is by far the worst in the league and they’ve given up 15 more goals than any other team. Despite being pegged as a potential playoff team by some, they are on pace for like 40 points. With analytics like that, even John Chayka is turning into more of an eye test guy.
Yet for all their early season struggles, that win in Montreal proves they are not a team the Senators can take lightly.
Ottawa will have to make at least one change to their line up but we won’t know exactly what that change is until a little closer to game time.
Chris Wideman suffered what Head Coach Guy Boucher called a ripped hamstring (Ahhh!) and he’s expected to be out for “weeks”. With Wideman going down and Nick Paul already with the team, they called up Ben Harpur to serve as a bit of insurance on the blueline.
So either Harpur draws in and they go 11/7 again or Paul gets the call and they go with a conventional 12/6. It also seems like there will be some changes to the forward combinations. Here’s how the Senators lined up at yesterday’s practice (minus Karlsson who was given the day off to rest his ankle).
Pyatt-Brassard-Stone
Dzingel-Duchene-Ryan
Hoffman-Pageau-DiDomenico
Burrows-Thompson-Paul
Claesson-Karlsson
Phaneuf-Ceci
Borowiecki-Oduya
Mike Condon gets the start in the Ottawa goal. Puck drop is scheduled for just after 2:00 PM.
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| Record | 3-15-3 (9 pts) | 8-4-5 (21 pts) |
| Goals For | 2.38 (30th) | 3.47 (T-5th) |
| Goals Against | 3.90 (31st) | 3.06 (T-18th) |
| Power Play | 15.5% (25th) | 19.7% (14th) |
| Penalty Kill | 78.0% (T-25th) | 79.6% (19th) |
| Shots For/Shots Against | 30.6 (T-21st) 32.8 (23rd) |
31.5 (18th) 30.0 (5th) |
| Leading Scorers | Keller- 18 pts Dvorak- 12 pts Ekman-Larsson- 11 pts |
Stone- 19 pts Karlsson- 17 pts Hoffman- 16 pts |
| CF% | 47.69% (25th) | 47.45% (26th) |
| Team Shooting % | 7.8% (T-26th) | 11.0% (7th) |
