Game 27 preview: Vancouver Canucks @ Ottawa Senators

The Ottawa Senators will look to avoid their sixth consecutive loss when they host the Vancouver Canucks tonight. Ottawa played some what decently against Pittsburgh yesterday afternoon but lost in regulation to a late goal. The Senators have fallen six points out of a playoff spot and are eight points ahead of the Edmonton Oilers for last place in the NHL.

Milan Michalek is out with an injury but Mark Stone will return. Craig Anderson will start again. Here are the lines from Gord Wilson.

MacArthur - Turris - Stone
Hoffman - Zibanejad - Ryan
Legwand - Smith - Neil
Condra - Lazar - Chiasson

Methot - Karlsson
Phillips - Ceci
Borowiecki - Gryba

Anderson (starter)
Lehner

Some notes for tonight:

• There was some chatter about Paul MacLean's job being on the line after his comments regarding being afraid of the players he has to put on the ice. That is obviously a bit of a shot at management and won't help his cause. The gap to a playoff spot might be too much to make up so it might be best to just keep MacLean until the end of the season and enjoy the high draft pick.
• Cody Ceci is one of three NHL defencemen with 20+ games this season that has yet to take a penalty.
• Erik Karlsson has a point on 13 of Ottawa's 19 power play goals.
• Robin Lehner returned to practice but is not eligible to return from injured reserve until Thursday.
• Zack Smith has gone from being one of Paul MacLean's favourites to moving in an out of the lineup. He didn't show much in his return yesterday.
• Mika Zibanejad has a goal in his last two games and a point in his last three games. So there is that at least.
• Karlsson has at least two shots on goal in his last 16 games. He has at least one shot in every game this season.
• Mark Stone has zero goals, two assists and just nine shots on goal in the 10 games since he scored in Vancouver.

Here are some stats for the two teams tonight. All stats are from NHL.com except Corsi and Fenwick are from naturalstattrick.com.