Okay, The Senators won the third period, but that’s a start. If you don’t think winning a period is important, well is has been a long time since they have done it. We need to go back 12 periods of Hockey to find a Senators win in a period. They have tied some, but the last time they outright won a period goes back to the 2nd period of the January 23rd game against the Jets. How long has it been since they blanked their opponents in a period? We need to go back 15 Hockey periods to the third period of the January 21st against those same Jets, this time on home ice. So, doing both last night in the third period against the Edmonton Oilers, may be the turnaround they need.
The 5 goals the Senators scored last night was certainly a break out for them. Last night’s goal scorers were, Brady Tkachuk, Colin White, Drake Batherson, Tim Stützle and Austin Watson. The last time they tallied that many was the January 15th game against the arch rival Toronto Maple Leafs. That game, and most where you score 5 goals, was and should be a victory.
The player the Senators were hoping to contain last night, Connor McDavid, had 1 goal and 4 assists. So, was he contained? Leon Draisaitl, countryman to our own Tim Stützle, had himself a good night with 6 assists. Not a bad night for Leon, no shots on goal, but 6 points. Other goal scorers for the Oiler were: James Neal with 2 goals, Kailer Yamamoto, Darnell Nurse, Ryan Nugent-Hopkins, Tyson Barrie and Dominik Kahun also put the puck past one of the two Senators goaltenders who played in the game.
Again, the Senators corrected the lack of scoring, but giving up 8 goals has got to mean back to the drawing board for DJ and his staff.
The Senators have given up 30 goals in the last 5 games. Even if they manage to continue scoring at a 5 goal per game pace, that wouldn’t be enough to overcome the 6 goals against average in those last 5 games. Hard to imagine getting more than 5 per game from this group, at the moment, or on a regular basis. In the last 5 games, the Senators have managed to score a total of 11 goals; that’s a 2.2 goal per game scoring average. I think there are many players on this roster that have the ability to score in the NHL. But they can’t score if the team is constantly defending in their own zone.
Yes, the Senators won the last period they played 2-0. But they have some work to do to tighten up all aspect of their game. Just my opinion.
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