After grinding out a win against the league’s last place team on Tuesday night, the Ottawa Senators return home to face a far more dangerous opponent.
Sidney Crosby, Evgeni Malkin and the rest of the Pittsburgh Penguins are in town as the Senators kick off a five game homestand at the Canadian Tire Centre. The Oilers are here Saturday and next week the Senators play host to the Hurricanes, Canadiens and Panthers.
The Penguins have been one of the most dangerous teams in the East for most of the season and as long as you have the likes of Crosby and Malkin in your top six, you are always going to be a contending team. They’ve still struggled to surround those players with legitimate talent although the David Perron acquisition was a good one. Unfortunately all the regular season success in the world doesn’t mean much for a team expected to win at playoff time. And as usual, it will likely come down to Marc Andre Fleury.
On the Senators side of the equation, the term “playing for pride” is being used unusually early this season. They are 12 points out of the final playoff spot and most fans have already started the discussion on the Entry Draft in June. But with 30 games left in their season, the Senators have to find a way to pushing forward and building towards future success. It’s fine for fans to talk about draft picks but that should be the furthest thing from the minds of the players. They just want to win some hockey games.
I gotta tell ya, these paragraphs about what the game means for the Senators are becoming increasingly difficult to write.
The Senators will make a couple changes to their line up including one up front and one on the back end. Cody Ceci draws back into the lineup after watching a game from the press box for the first time this season. With Ceci returning, Patrick Wiercioch is the odd man out. Up front, it looks like Jean Gabriel Pageau will finally end up scratched. He avoided it the last couple games but assuming Ryan is good to go tonight, Pageau is the guy that sits.
Just an optional skate this morning so here’s a best guess at tonight’s line up.
Hoffman-Zibanejad-Ryan
Michalek-Turris-Stone
MacArthur-Lazar-Chiasson
Condra-Legwand-Neil
Methot-Karlsson
Cowen-Ceci
Borowiecki-Gryba
Robin Lehner gets the start in the Otttawa goal. Puck drop is scheduled for just after 7:30 PM with the game available on TSN5 and RDS2.
