Game 21 Preview + Open Thread: Ottawa Senators @ Carolina Hurricanes

Sens face another battle against top team

  • The Ottawa Senators may have officially reached rock bottom after losing to the Vancouver Canucks last night. Tonight, they face a much harder opponent in the Carolina Hurricanes and it will be interesting to see how the Sens respond after the embarrassing showing last night./

It seems sending Matt Murray to Belleville hasn’t helped the goalie situation in Ottawa. It appears the issue was maybe defense all along but who would have known? Either way, as expected with a back to back, Anton Forsberg will be starting in net tonight.

DJ Smith seems to be reverting back to Stützle on centre and it would be nice to see him in that position for a longer period of time and see how he would adjust. Newcomer Adam Gaudette scored his first goal last night and hopefully he goes on some sort of run.

According to DJ Smith, lineup stays the same as last night with Tyler Ennis coming back into the lineup - the decision on who he’s replacing is still to be determined. As mentioned above, Anton Forsberg will be in net.

The big questions:

  • Will the Sens ever win again?
  • Seriously, will they?
  • Will we ever hear anything from Pierre Dorion or Pierre “Media Mastermind” McGuire?
  • Will Drake Batherson continue his point-per-game pace?
  • Would there be anything more Sens than beating one of the best teams in the league after falling to three of the worst back-to-back-to-back?/

Game details for tonight:

Stats Preview

Team Stats

Game 26OttawaSenatorsFloridaPanthers
Category#Rank#Rank
Goals/GP2.6426th3.72nd
Goals Against/GP3.7232nd2.712th
Shots/GP28.429th36.11st
Shots Against/GP34.130th30.611th
Powerplay %19.10%15th18.80%17th
Penalty Kill %75.30%27th81.00%16th
Corsi % (5v5 SVA)44.81%31st57.13%1st
xGF % (5v5 SVA)45.20%31st56.26%1st

Player Stats

Game 26OttawaSenatorsFloridaPanthers
CategoryPlayer#Player#
GoalsJosh Norris12Aleksander Barkov10
AssistsDrake Batherson 16Jonathan Huberdeau22
PointsDrake Batherson 24Jonathan Huberdeau31
ShotsBrady Tkachuk72Aaron Ekblad90
Time on Ice/GPThomas Chabot27:09Aaron Ekblad25:39

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