Back in October, the Ottawa Senators had talked about wanting to be a team that could handle adversity. And then in like the second week of the season, they got smacked up side the head with a dose of it.
Brady Tkachuk is the heartbeat of this team so the idea of playing the first two months without him seemed more than daunting. Especially considering the ghosts of Octobers and Novembers past. And yet as we enter the last week of November, the Senators are knocking on the door of the Atlantic Division lead and have posted a ridiculous 10-4-4 record during Brady’s absence. And the Captain is coming back soon too.
The Ottawa Senators continue their seven-game road trip with a stop in Los Angeles, California on Monday night.
Couple changes expected to the Ottawa lineup tonight. First of all, Thomas Chabot is out again. He didn’t finish the game against the Sharks the other night and isn’t expected to play. Ridly Greig mysterious absence continues. Here is how the Senators are expected to line up for this one.
Perron-Stützle-Batherson
Eller-Cozens-Zetterlund
Amadio-Pinto-Giroux
Cousins-Halliday-Hodgson
Sanderson-Zub
Kleven-Spence
Matinpalo-Jensen
Leevi Merilainen starts.
That puck isn’t droppin’ till 9:00 PM, so rest up. The game is on Amazon Prime so make sure you are sending some of your money to Jeff Bezos every month so you can watch your favourite hockey team. TSN1200 has the radio call or alternatively, you can just have someone with an Amazon subscription watch the game and you can look at them while they describe it to you.
Wondering how these teams match up and you have stricken last weekend’s game from your memory? A closer look via something I’m calling the HEAD2HEAD table.
| HEAD2HEAD |  |
 |
|---|---|---|
| Record | 11-6-4 (26 pts) | 10-6-6 (26 pts) |
| Goals For | 3.24 (6th) | 2.68 (27th) |
| Goals Against | 3.29 (25th) | 2.68 (5th) |
| Power Play | 23.5% (11th) | 14.3% (28th) |
| Penalty Kill | 70.0% (31st) | 80.6% (15th) |
| Shots For | 26.5 (14th) | 29.4 (10th) |
| Shots Against | 25.1 (2nd) | 26.0 (8th) |
| Leading Scorers | Stutzle-21 pts Batherson-20 pts Cozens-16 pts Pinto-16 pts Sanderson-15 pts |
Kempe-20 pts Byfield-17 pts Fiala-16 pts Kopitar-12 pts Perry-12 pts |
| Starting Goalie | TBD | TBD |