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The Ottawa Senators entertain the Boston Bruins today in an early afternoon start at 12:30 pm for the first of two games between these division rivals in a week. This will be the Sens' fourth game in six days, so you would think this will be a defensive battle with Ottawa not having the same legs that they had early in the week and it showed against Pittsburgh in Thursday night's 2-0 loss.
Matt Murray was outstanding against his former club stopping 42 of 43 shots but the Sens depth truly caught up to them against a very sound Pens team that will contend to come out off the Eastern Conference when the playoffs kick off in May.
It will be interesting to see if DJ Smith will finally put Nikita Zaitsev on the 3rd pairing on the blueline for an entire game. When he isn't paired against the opposition's top two lines, he plays his role much better in that role. The coach needs to put players in the best position possible to make them successful and DJ isn't doing Chabot any favours by having Zaitsev paired with him. Chabot has been far more successful since December when paired with Lassi Thomason, Erik Brannstrom, or JBD. It's no coincidence that when Zaitsev was out of the lineup that Chabot played some of his best hockey when not having to worry about Zaitsev's deficiencies.
There has been no formal announcement about who will be in goal but you have to imagine that Murray and Anton Forsberg will split the two afternoon starts this weekend. Murray should play today against Boston as the coaching staff will be putting him in a tough spot if he starts in Washington. Ottawa wraps up the weekend with a quick trip to Washington for another 12:30 pm start on Super Bowl Sunday. Ottawa needs to grab these two points today in the standings, DJ needs to give his team the best chance to win today because Washington is going to be well rested when the Sens arrive to face the Caps. Do you want a fatigued Sens team in front of your backup or your starting goaltender in Washington?
Clark Bishop could get into the lineup today, to give the team some fresh leg. I'm quite surprised that Chris Tierney hasn't been a healthy scratch even with all injuries. I wouldn't be surprised to see some different line combinations as well, in the hopes that a few players elevate their level of play.
The BSens won 2-1 last night in Wilkes-Barre/Scranton, with Filip Gustavsson stopping 31 of 32 shots! They are 2-0 this week on their road trip and they wrap it up tonight in Hershey.
Who would you start in goal today, Murray or Forsberg?
Thanks for reading. Kevin