Game 3 preview: Ottawa Senators @ Detroit Red Wings

The Ottawa Senators had a dominant performance against Montréal on Saturday, but needed a late equaliser plus the shootout to pull out a 4-3 victory. The Senators are now 2-0-0 on the season while tonight's opponents, the Detroit Red Wings are 0-2-0 having been outscored 10-5 in their opening two losses. On Saturday against the Panthers, the Red WIngs were outshot 38-22 despite trailing pretty much the entire game.

Andrew Hammond is expected to make his first start of the season while Matt Puempel will replace Philip Varone. Ottawa area prankster Mark Borowiecki keeps his place on a professional hockey team as well. Here are the expected lines and pairings.

Hoffman - Turris - Stone
Smith - Brassard - Ryan
Dzingel - Pageau - Pyatt
Puempel - Kelly - Neil

Methot - Karlsson
Phaneuf - Ceci
Borowiecki - Wideman

Hammond (starter)
Anderson

Some notes for tonight:

• Erik Karlsson's next goal will break a tie with Wade Redden for most career goals by a Senators defenceman.
• Everyone on the Senators top six has at least two points with the exception of Mike Hoffman who is without a point. Hoffman is tied for the lead among Senators forwards with seven shots on goal though.
• Cody Ceci is averaging 24:27 of ice time over the first two games. His pairing with Dion Phaneuf has been somewhat disappointing for me.
• The Senators had over three and a half minutes of either 5-on-3 or 4-on-3 time and could not score on Saturday. That allowed the game to be a lot closer than it should have been.
• For the most part, it really was a fantastic performance by Ottawa. With a game tonight against a struggling Detroit team, the Sens have a real chance to make it three wins out of three.
• After two games, the Senators are bordering on league average with 31 shots allowed per game, which is the 19th fewest in the NHL. League average defence would be a massive improvement for this club.
• Matt Puempel for Philip Varone is a shrug whatever move to me. How do you guys feel?
• When will Thomas Chabot play?
• The Senators are one of seven teams without a power play goal so far.
• After nine goals in the first game, the Senators second game had a total of six goals. There certainly hasn't been a lack of scoring in Ottawa's games. Scoring league wide seems to be up at the start of the year.
• Zack Smith plays as a winger but he has won 11 out of the 12 faceoffs taken this year.
• Both of Chris Wideman's points have been primary assists.
• The Senators will look to start 3-0 for the first time since the 2012-2013 lockout season./

Here are some stats for the two teams tonight for last season. All stats are from NHL.com except Corsi and Fenwick are from www.puckon.net.