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Senators lose ugly to the Blues |
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That dreaded first game back from a road trip jumped up and bit the Ottawa Senators Tuesday night, and bit them big time.
Whether or not that old superstition is to blame, the Senators definitely didn't come into this game with any sort of intensity or push back as the Blues steamrolled Andrew Hammond and the Senators to the tune of 6-0.
Mercifully, my PVR stopped recording with about 4 minutes left so I did not have to witness the final bit of pain, but in the first 56 minutes or so I got the gist of what was going on.
Good players making bad plays, bad players making bad plays and a majority of scoring chances not even resulting in shots on goal pretty much sums it up...and the Senators performance in the building was about as messy as the weather was outside it.
While in some aspects the stats say it was pretty close - each team had 30 shots, both clubs had 28 hits, the Senators were never really in it. The most telling stats might just be that 1) the recorded giveaways were 19 by Ottawa and 6 by the Blues and 2) Ottawa blocked only 10 shot attempts, well below their season average of 16+.
As for the big storyline of the game, Andrew Hammond replacing Mike Condon, it was anticlimactic. Patrick Roy in his prime wouldn't have won that game, because the Senators gave away multiple chances and hung Hammond out to dry numerous times. Although, even taking into account it was his first start since before Christmas, his style in the net shows why he wasn't able to duplicate "the run". The first goal he left his post far to early, the second goal instead of pushing across with his leg to try to stay square to the (wide open) shooter, he basically flopped face first and gave himself zero chance to make a save. He also let out a couple of bad rebounds that directly resulted in goals, but you could also argue that those players should have been picked up by the non-existent Senators defense in front of him. So, not his fault, but Hammond also didn't show much push-back in what could end up being his last appearance in a Senators uniform.
None of that really matters when your team gives you 0 goal support, and the Senators haven't scored on an actual goalie over 129 minutes of game action and 73 shots on goal. Jake Allen also faced 30 shots, but you would be hard pressed to point to more than 2 or 3 really quality scoring chances where the Senators didn't shoot wide and actually forced the Blues goalie (who has struggled this season) to make a save. In this case it was quantity winning out over quality off the sticks of the Senators.
The Senators picked a bad time to go into a slump, just when there was some true optimism about a great January, they have finished that month and started off this one by going 1-3-1 in their last 5 games, all teams that are (or were) below them in the standings. With the announced attendance of almost 17,000 (I am not sure what the actual might have been), it was a decent crowd that was "treated" to a sad performance and a team with attendance issues can't afford to put too many of those together on home ice.
Tomorrow is another day and the Senators will have an opportunity to right the ship on Thursday when they host the Jason Spezza-less Dallas Stars, a team that is on the skids themselves and on the brink of losing touch with the playoff race.
Ottawa Senators Blogger • 
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