With the beginning of a tough stretch of games, your Ottawa Senators got off on the wrong foot against the Vancouver Canucks. Exactly 22 seconds into the game, the Sedin twins got loose in Ottawa’s zone to put them up one nothing. From there, the Ottawa Senators played a strong 40 minutes against the Canucks, got on the board and only trailed 2-1 going into the third. Then the wheels fell off.
First the positives.
Peter Regin was a beast against the Nucks. He was skating hard, chasing down every puck and he even took a hard shot from Kevin Bieksa to draw a penalty too. For his efforts, Regin was rewarded with his first of the season. Not a pretty goal, but its the ones that go in when you work hard.
Sergei Gonchar continued his offensive output with another goal against Vancouver. Blasting it from the point, Gonchar now has four goals on the year and is like a fine wine, getting better with age.
Matt Carkner had a huge game. Playing over 16 minutes and being a plus-1 on the night when six goals were scored, Carkner has improved his play since the start of the season. Carkner also had his second fight in as many games as he made quick work of ‘Little Giant’ Rick Rypien.
For two periods, Ottawa skated with Vancouver and looked like they were going to make this game a nail-biter to the end. But when they came out for the third period, Ottawa seemed to forget the period had started. Before they could blink, Vancouver scored twice 1:11 into the third to make the game 4-1 for the Nucks. From there, Ottawa created no offense and was out skated by all four Vancouver lines.
In his first game back from injury, Pascal Leclaire did not play a bad game, but he still let in six goals. ‘Happy Feet’ over committed on a few plays that led to pucks in the back of the net. (But in all fairness, this was a tough game for Leclaire to come in for after not playing for more than a month)
Ottawa’s special teams had a good and bad game. Their Penalty Kill got back on track as they shutout Vancouver on both of their powerplays. At the other end, Ottawa’s PowerPlay also got shutout on each of their four chances.
***Three Stars***
First Star: Ryan Kesler – earns it with two goals and a dominating performance.
Second Star: Bobby Luo – earns it with 33 saves and momentum killing performance.
Third Star: Peter Regin – earns it with a goal and an assist and for his tireless effort in the game.
If this game was a test of how Ottawa stacks up against the big boys in the league, well then sound the doomsday alarm. With a game versus the Bruins on deck, Ottawa needed to get at least one point in this game.
‘Til next time, GO SENS GO!!!!!
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