For the second straight night the Senators went down swinging, this time mounting a furious third period rally against the Leafs.
Despite falling 6-5 to their provincial rivals, this Sens showed real signs of life in the third period and should be feeling pretty good about themselves heading into Tuesday's home opener against the Minnesota Wild.
Ottawa scored five times in the third period and were able to make a game of it late. Erik Karlsson registered assists on the final three Ottawa goal including a gorgeous feed to Stephane Da Costa that made it a one goal game with just under two minutes to play.
For MacLean and his staff the challenge now becomes cleaning up the opening forty minutes. Ottawa is turning the puck over far too often and on consecutive nights, made life fairly easy for their opponents.
It's hard when the defence is consistently hanging you out to dry but Craig Anderson has to be better for Ottawa and he knows it.
I expect a bounce back game from him on Tuesday night.
Despite the 0-2 start, I see some very promising signs from this young Sens team. They have shown a ton of fight this weekend and that has to be a good sign moving forward. I also really like the way players have been coming to the defence of each other on the ice. It's just two games in but you can already see that this group of guys really care.
Should be interesting to see what the club does with the line up for Tuesday night with both Bobby Butler and David Rundblad ready to draw in. Ottawa has the day off today and will return to the ice on Monday morning.
Happy Thanksgiving everyone!
