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Gameday: The Streak Stops Today - Right?

February 7, 2012, 2:35 PM ET [48 Comments]
Travis Yost
Ottawa Senators Blogger • RSSArchiveCONTACT
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Embattled in a six-game losing streak, the Ottawa Senators have been searching long and hard for answers. The offense has been stymied with regularity; the defense as egregiously charitable as it has been all season long. And, even Craig Anderson appears to be cooling off at the worst of times.

In the middle of a playoff hunt, a team simply can't afford to drop seven straight games. They'll have the chance to avoid such a harrowing fate if they can protect home ice against the St. Louis Blues, a team that's surged through an extremely competitive Western Conference under new head coach Ken Hitchcock.

For Ottawa, St. Louis probably isn't the best match-up in the world, especially for a Senators team that's scored just eight goals in the past six games. St. Louis is the NHL's best team defensively, yielding just 1.94 goals per game. The Blues have parlayed their defensive and goaltending success into a surplus of wins, and currently sit in 5th place (30-14-7, 67 PTS) in the Western Conference.

The only positive here? St. Louis has been awful - relatively speaking - on the road. Their eight wins on the road this year is the worst among playoff-standing teams in the National Hockey League; a pale contrast to their impressive 22-3-4 record on home ice.

The Blues have just two scorers on the team above the thirty point mark, but both David Backes(16G/21A) and T.J Oshie (14G/18A) have proven to be valuable commodities for a Blues team that prides itself in two-way play. Without question, keeping the number of impact shifts down for the two aforementioned is a real key to victory for Paul MacLean's club.

If the Ottawa Senators are to snap out of their malaise, they're going to have to do so against a familiar face in Brian Elliott. Elliott was recently on Scotiabank Place ice for the 2012 All-Star Game, much to the dismay of fans in Ottawa who had grown accustomed to his erratic play. On the year, Elliotts posted a 15-5-2 record, .938 save percentage, and 1.69 GAA - absurd splits for even the most elite National Hockey League netminder.

In perhaps the least surprising news of all-time, Elliott will square off against Craig Anderson, who'll make his eighteenth(!) consecutive start for Ottawa. Anderson's posted a 25-18-5 record, .909 save percentage, and 2.95 GAA through 50 games played.

Paul MacLean's went ahead and made a couple of tweaks to the lineup, reuniting Colin Greening on the top-line with Jason Spezza and Milan Michalek. It appears Erik Condra's run on L1 was short-lived. Jim O'Brien will again skate on L4, pushing Bobby Butler to the press box.

St. Louis will be without Jason Arnott on Tuesday, as he's headed to Toronto for therapy. Head coach Ken Hitchcock still has him listed as day-to-day.

Puck drops at 7:30 PM ET on SNET.

St. Louis Blues
Langenbrunner-Backes-Oshie
Perron-Berglund-D'Agostini
Porter-Sobotka-Stewart
Crombeen-Nichol-Reaves

Colaiacovo-Pietrangelo
Jackman-Shattenkirk
Russell-Polak

Ottawa Senators
Greening-Spezza-Michalek
Condra-Turris-Alfredsson
Foligno-Smith-Neil
Daugavins-Konopka-O'Brien

Kuba-Karlsson
Cowen-Gonchar
Phillips-Carkner

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