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Game Day: Senators @ Kings - Milestone for Chris Neil |
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The Ottawa Senators escaped their first stop in California with a win, 4-2 over the Sharks in San Jose. Now they travel a few hours south for the first of a back to back in the LA region. They begin with a tilt against the Kings at Staples Centre, an afternoon where Chris Neil will suit up for his 1,000th NHL game. I wrote yesterday about the unlikelihood of Neil reaching this milestone, if you missed it click on the link below)
The Kings were looking for a bounce-back season after missing the playoffs last year (edit: oops it was two seasons ago they missed, they did make it last year), but a long term injury suffered by Jonathan Quick in the season opener has put them in a tough situation. Peter Budaj has done a decent job in filling in under tough circumstances, but he is no Quick and consistency is an issue.
They have allowed at least 3 goals in each of their last 4 games, going 1-2-1 in that stretch, but that came on the heels of a 5 game winning streak where they allowed just 2 goals in each game. Zeff Zatkoff started the Kings last game, a 3-1 loss to the Hurricanes on Thursday night.
The Kings allow the fewest shots per game in the league, which has helped to insulate the goaltending tandem.
They are led offensively by Jeff Carter, whose 11 goals and 21 points lead the team, while Anze Kopitar has struggled to find the back of the net with just 2 goals so far.
Besides Neil's milestone, the focus of this matchup as usual will be Erik Karlsson and Drew Doughty. The last two Norris Trophy winners are two of the top blueliners in the league, but many in Karlsson's camp still feel he was robbed of a third Norris by Doughty's win last season.
Doughty has 14 points (5G, 9A) in 26 games with a +3 rating, while Karlsson leads the Senators with 27 points (7G, 20A) in 27 games buoyed by his seven points in the last two games to vault into first in the league among blueliners. He also sports a +5 rating.
The Senators have allowed almost 150 shot attempts in their last two games, albeit against last year's Stanley Cup champions and finalists. Mike Condon was stellar against the Sharks and the Senators have relied on goaltending for a lot of their wins this season. It will be interesting to see if Guy Boucher rides Condon in both games, or if he will give Andrew Hammond a shot against the Ducks on Sunday.
Mike Hoffman and Mark Stone have paced the offense (along with Karlsson), especially over the last 6 games. Hoffman is riding a 6 game point streak (9 points), while Stone has points in 5 of the last 6 and has 8 points in that time frame. Most of that damage has been done on the power play, which has been almost 50% over the last 6 games (if you could somehow take out the 0 for 7 anomaly against Florida).
Fortunately for fans in the East, both of these games are afternoon tilts on the West Coast, so we can avoid having to stay up well past midnight to see the outcome. Both are 4:00 eastern time starts.
Ottawa Senators Blogger • 
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