The free-falling Ottawa Senators are coming home.
The 29th place Senators play two games at the Canadian Tire Centre this weekend, beginning with a Friday night match-up against the third place team from the Metropolitan Division, the Columbus Blue Jackets.
Then they are right back at it on Saturday night against the same Boston Bruins. It’s a tough back to back for a Senators team that really can’t do anything right lately.
Despite the recent struggles, it seems like both games this weekend are close to sold out. There’s always a bit of an attendance boost for post-Christmas home games and it helps to have so many hockey fans in town for the Bell Capital Cup.
Following the loss to the Bruins, Guy Boucher talked about giving more opportunity to the team’s young players going forward. Chabot was up over 20 minutes against the Bruins and Chlapik saw more ice time in the third period.
“There are three ways to react to pressure and adversity…you fight, you freeze or you fly away…I choose to fight.”#Sens Head Coach Guy Boucher speaks with the media following today’s practice at CTC. pic.twitter.com/9YbuuGY9AY
— Ottawa Senators (@Senators) December 28, 2017
Expect to see more of the same against the Blue Jackets.
Chlapik was centring the team’s third line with Hoffman and Pageau at practice which means he’ll likely get a chance to play with some skilled players. Meanwhile, Chabot played a lot of the third period with Erik Karlsson and could go back to that duo at times tonight.
Game Day skate scheduled for 10:30 AM this morning. A best guess at the line up for now.
Dzingel-Duchene-Ryan
Pyatt-Brassard-Stone
Hoffman-Chlapik-Pageau
Paul-Thompson-Burrows
Oduya-Karlsson
Phaneuf-Ceci
Harpur-Chabot
Mike Condon gets the start in goal for Ottawa. Puck drop is scheduled for just after 7:30 PM.
-It’s safe to say the rumour mill will be churning in the Nation’s Capital from here on out. Right now it seems like most of the talk is focused on winger Mike Hoffman. Not necessarily because he’s a player the Senators feel they have to move but rather because he’s the guy most teams are calling about. Dorion will be expected to cut pay roll leading up to the deadline and Hoffman’s $5.65 mil salary this year is probably the easiest move. Even though it really doesn’t make much sense for the Senators. Last night, Bruce Garrioch mentioned that the St. Louis Blues were the leading candidate to land Hoffman but that seems like an intentional leak to encourage other teams to up the ante. Although there was talk that Ottawa had interest in injured forward Robby Fabbri in the summer.
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|---|---|---|
| Record | 22-13-3 (47 pts) | 11-16-8 (30 pts) |
| Goals For | 2.76 (20th) | 2.63 (27th) |
| Goals Against | 2.66 (6th) | 3.26 (28th) |
| Power Play | 11.8% (30th) | 16.1% (25th) |
| Penalty Kill | 80.8% (15th) | 79.0% (23rd) |
| Shots For/Shots Against | 34.2 (5th) 31.3 (12th) |
30.5 (24th) 31.3 (11th) |
| Leading Scorers | Panarin- 33 pts Bjorkstrand- 24 pts Anderson- 22 pts |
Stone- 32 pts Hoffman- 24 pts Brassard- 23 pts |
| Team Save % | .915% (10th) | .896% (T-28th) |
| Team Shooting % | 8.1% (T-26th) | 8.6% (T-18th) |
