Mike Condon will try to put Summerside PEI in the rear view mirror and put in a better effort than the 7 goals he allowed in half a game to the New Jersey Devils when the Senators head west to face the Winnipeg Jets.
The loss was the first of the pre-season, and while the goaltending wasn't great, the blame doesn't fall solely on the shoulders of Condon, that was a team effort. After that debacle three more players were moved off the roster. Filip Chlapik was sent to Belleville, Tyler Randell was put on waivers to be sent to Belleville, and Chris VandeVelde was released from his PTO.
With just two more exhibition games before the start of the season, the Senators are closer to icing what should be their opening night lineup, other than Craig Anderson and Derick Brassard. There are still a couple of questions to be answered, like who will get the 12th forward spot, and will Logan Brown start the season with the team.
Alex Formenton is still with the club, which is sort of puzzling because as well as he has played at times, he still has a lot of growing to to and he sort of looks like bambi on ice at 6'2", 174 lbs. I guess they like what they have seen, and when he puts 15 or 20 pounds of muscle on his frame to be stronger he might have a chance, but as things ramp up you would hate to see him get in a difficult situation and get injured to set back his development as the games get more real. I can't see him staying with the club past Saturday, and if they like what they see I can see why they are rewarding him, but the time has probably come to get him back to junior where he can have a solid full season.
As of this writing, the Jets haven't publicized what their roster will look like, but beware of the Jets power play. They have scored 9 times on 30 opportunities so far in the preseason. Patrick Laine is a big part of that, as he had four power play points as part of his five point night in Winnipeg's last game, a 5-2 win over the Flames.