The Ottawa Senators will visit the New Jersey Devils tonight at the Prudential Center. Despite hopes that they may have Jake Sanderson or Artem Zub back in their lineup, the writing was on the wall when the club recalled Belleville Senators defenceman Jorian Donovan for some roster reassurance on this quick, one game road trip. Prior to their exciting comeback win versus the Nashville Predators Saturday night, extra defenceman Cam Crotty was deemed out of the lineup and was then added to the club’s injured list.
Head coach Travis Green did some line shuffling and tweaking at the team’s morning skate. Warren Foegele appears to be getting another look on the club’s top line with centre Tim Stützle and winger Drake Batherson. He replaces André Burakovsky who had his regular season debut Saturday in the top line, left wing slot. The Senators are trying to find more depth on their left wing to replace the left ankle injury to William Eklund. At the moment, they seem to be trying in-house, bandaid options but nothing has quite clicked.
Burakovsky now is on the club’s second line with centre Dylan Cozens and left winger Ridly Greig. The club needs more offensive production out of this trio with many eyes in the fan base closely watching Cozens and Burakovsky in particular. As reported by Andrew Wilimek, Burakovsky and Cozens will both be on the team’s top power play unit. With their speed, puck possession and talent, the hope is that they can generate some scoring opportunities in Eklund’s absence.
This also means that Fabian Zetterlund has now been put back on the club’s fourth line, where he spent a majority of last season. Zetterlund was promoted to the top six primarily due to his past chemistry with Eklund in San Jose. In the game versus Nashville, he remained on the team’s second line with Cozens and Greig but they were unable to muster up enough grade-A chances.
The most consistent line
The club’s only consistent line through the first handful of games has been that of Michael Amadio, Shane Pinto and Claude Giroux. With just over 35 minutes combined together, the trio has a 45% expected goal percentage. Together, they have a combined 10 goals and 8 assists over just five games. Building off of their spectacular chemistry last season, the ‘GPA line’ seems to be the most consistent offensive line for the club at the moment.
Linus Ullmark is expected to make his fifth start of the season. The Vezina winning goalie seems to be back to his most elite calibre of play. He has gone undefeated in his four starts and has a remarkable 0.942 save percentage and a 1.34 goals-against average. This is a massive improvement from last year. Ullmark also has 13 career wins against the Devils which is the second most against any opponent in his career.
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