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Game Day: Ottawa @ Florida - ice cold vs red hot |
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This little road trip through Florida could get ugly quick.
The Ottawa Senators will face two of the hottest teams in the NHL in the next two nights, and will do so without their best player in the lineup.
Ottawa departed for the Miami area yesterday, but Mark Stone was not with the team as he is nursing a leg injury resulting from a couple of blocked shots during Friday night's loss to the Flames.
The Senators couldn't have picked a worse time for this Sunshine State sojourn, as since February 20th, neither the Panthers nor the Lightning have lost in regulation, a combined 19 games.
Tonight's opponent, Florida, is 8-0-1 in their last 9 and have drawn within 2 points of Columbus and 3 points of the Devils, who hold down the two Wild Card spots at the moment, while the Panthers also hold 3 games in hand on both of those Metropolitan division clubs.
In fact, since the All-Star break, only Nashville (33) has more points than Florida's 31 points, and Nashville has played 2 more games than the Panthers in that stretch. So arguably there is no team playing better than the Panthers.
Aleksander Barkov (10 goals and 25 points) and Evgeni Dadonov (11 goals and 22 points) are leading the way for the Cats offensively, with defenseman Keith Yandle also stepping up with 2 goals and 19 assists in that 19 game stretch of hotness.
Florida is doing it with offense, defense and special teams as they have bought into first year head coach Bob Bougner's system. Since the break they are 6th in goals for, 6th in goals against, have the league's best power play at just a shade under 30% and have the 10th best PK.
So it is a daunting task for the Senators, who come to town limping following back to back losses to Buffalo (in a shootout) and Calgary on home ice. This is a case of a team hungry for the playoffs facing a team for which the season can't end quickly enough.
Stone's absence will be felt as he has been Ottawa's best and most consistent player night in and night out. His 63 points leads the team by 12, his 20 goals also leads the team and his 43 assists is just one behind Erik Karlsson. He is also the only forward with a positive +/- rating (+9) and one of only 2 currently active Senators to be on the good side of even (Mark Borowiecki at +2 being the other). Stone had his 10 game point streak snapped on Friday but he finished the game with more than 20 minutes of ice time despite the injury that is forcing him to remain in Ottawa while his teammates get some sun.
Ottawa hasn't announced any call-ups as of yet, so it looks like Jim O'Brien will draw back in to replace Stone in the lineup after he was scratched on Friday night. Either that or they will go with 7 defensemen and get Erik Burgdoerfer into a game.
It will be a personal and emotional night for former Panthers goalie Craig Anderson, who obviously now patrols the crease for the Senators. Anderson and his family live in the Parkland neighborhood that was the location of last months terrible school shooting, and in fact Anderson's kids will be attending that high school when they get to that age.
Anderson and Erik Karlsson will host a couple of hockey teams from the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School at the arena during the day today and they have got tickets for the teams to go to the game tonight, to help at least some of the kids affected by such a great tragedy, and give them at least a few hours to avoid thinking so much about what went on that day, and the positivity that seems to be coming out in the wake of such a nightmare.
Good on the Senators duo for taking that step today, because some things are much bigger than hockey.
Ottawa Senators Blogger • 
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