Much like in Florida the other night, the Ottawa Senators were the better hockey team on Tuesday night but come up empty.
The Sens got goals from Daniel Alfredsson and Guillaume Latendresse but Steven Stamkos scored late in the third period and former Senator Ben Bishop shut the door the rest of the way as the Sens fell by a 3-2 in final. The loss is the fifth straight for the Senators.
Hate to blame the officials but when a team scores a 5 on 3 goal on a completely blown call and then scores the go ahead goal on a blatant dive, I feel like it's fair to openly questioning the officiating. It certainly doesn't help that Dan O'Rourke was one of the guys calling the game.
Complaining won't do much for the Senators now though as this a fifth straight loss as left the team on shaky ground in the Eastern Conference. The New York Islanders beat Philadelphia tonight and have now pulled even with the Senators at 44 points. The Jets also won and now sit in 9th place with 42 points.
Just two points back of the Sens.
Fans can, will and have pushed the panic button but Paul MacLean and this team just have to find a way to work through this slump. They are outplaying teams but just haven't been able to close out games in the third. Obviously there are areas to be addressed in Ottawa's game right now but it's not like they are being blown out.
A loss is a loss at this time of the year though.
They won't have much time to dwell on this latest setback as they get set to play what feels like a season defining back to back on Thursday and Friday night against the Flyers and Devils.
Deep breaths…
- After a couple days of good news on the Erik Karlsson front, Renaud Lavoie from RDS was the first to put a timetable on his return suggesting that if all goes according to plan, Karlsson would be back in the line up in 3-4 weeks. Interesting to note that the NHL playoffs start 3 weeks from now.
