Mike Condon faced a lot of shots in the Ottawa Senators net Thursday night, but fortunately for his teammates, he also stopped a lot of shots. Like all of them. Forty three in total, and he was almost his own worst enemy in terms of recording the shutout as the Senators downed the mighty Blue Jackets 2-0 in Columbus.

After his team bailed him out of a shaky performance on Tuesday in St. Louis, Condon returned the favor in spades as his team was outshot 43-28 but now have back to back wins against quality opponents on the road.

Kyle Turris scored the first goal of the game, which proved to be the winner after taking a long pass that threaded the needle through traffic from Erik Karlsson, from the defensive zone to the Columbus Blue line, Turris splitting the defense and burying it past Sergei Bobrovsky with a nice backhand deke.

Just after a Senators power play ended in the second period, it was another slick pass from a defenseman, this time Chris Wideman whose pass to the top of the crease was deflty deflected home by Ryan Dzingel for a very important insurance goal heading into the third period.

Condon was the story in the third period as the Blue Jackets put on the pressure. They had their chances in terms of shots and scrambles in the goalmouth, but Condon almost shot himself and his team in the foot late in the frame. With Marc Methot already off serving a penalty for grabbing and pulling down the guy he was traded for, Nick Foligno, Condon gloved down a shot and tried to bank it off the glass and out on his own.

The problem was that the glass in Columbus was simply too damn short, by which I mean any glass in any rink in any league wouldn't have kept that shot that got away in the rink and Condon put his team down two men for a full minute. Condon, aided by some solid penalty killing especially from Cody Ceci and Dion Phaneuf kept the Blue Jackets at bay and the best scoring chance was a rocket from Seth Jones that rang off the crossbar and somehow bounced back into Condon's legs without being deflected back behind him. The fortuitous bounce for Ottawa kept the shutout intact and Ottawa did hang on to beat one of the top teams in the league on their own ice.

With the win, the Senators jumped past the Maple Leafs (who lost to the Rangers) and also the Bruins and now sit second in the Atlantic Division still with 5 games in hand on Boston. They are also now even in terms of goals for and goals against, having been on the negative side of that ledger for a lot of the season. (And before you start pointing out that they are listed as being +2 in the standings, shootout wins and losses count for a goal for and/or a goal against in calculating standings.)

It now sets up a second straight Saturday night showdown with the Maple Leafs, this time in a rink where unlike last week it will be a completely hostile environment, while last week it was only about half and half-ish as Sens home games against the Leafs traditionally are.

It will be interesting to see how Guy Boucher handles the goaltending situation this weekend, with a back to back when Columbus visits the Senators on Sunday. That will be a late afternoon home game with a 5:00 start, following what should be an intense game on Saturday night in Toronto. Condon will get 4 days off at the All-Star break next weekend to rest, but he has put in a yeoman's effort in appearing in 20 straight games and I would think that he will get a rest in at least one of the games this weekend. Either that or Boucher rides the hot hand as hard as he can, hoping Condon can hold out until the weekend, with 4 games between now and next Thursday night. If Condon plays both, it will show how little faith the team has in Chris Driedger (the current backup) and Matt O'Connor (the previous backup who was swapped out so he could get some games in) to do the job even for a game. The result and workload Condon gets on Saturday might determine who gets the nod Sunday. A win over the Leafs creates a bit of breathing room and perhaps a rest for the starter, while a loss puts them right back into the thick of things, and a bounce-back on Sunday is important.

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