The PNC Arena and the Carolina Hurricanes continued to show their mastery of the Ottawa Senators, at least in the final result.
The Senators proved that you can only hang onto the edge of the cliff for so long, because after precariously holding onto a 1 goal lead for over 20 minutes, a two and a half minute barrage with the extra attacker finally paid off for the Canes when Jeff Skinner scored with 3.3 seconds left on the clock to force overtime.
Icing proved to be the undoing of the Senators, as it was an icing call that forced Dave Cameron to leave Mika Zibanejad (he of the 38% faceoff winning percentage on the night) on the ice for the faceoff that led to the tying goal. It was also a misplay by Andrew Hammond, trying to lead the breakout with a long pass that missed its mark creating an icing call in overtime with the Senators not having a natural center on the ice that led to the Jordan Staal OT winner.
As I said yesterday, for some reason Ottawa is not successful in Raleigh (an understatement). That fact reared its ugly head again as the Senators were soundly outplayed and if not for Hammond they wouldn't have even come away with the point they did. The Senators were outshot in every period with the final total being 46-21, and in terms of shot attempts it was an 85-44 Hurricanes edge (60-44 at even strength).
Chris Wideman scored his first NHL goal, one that looked like it might hold up as the game winner until Skinner's late game heroics, getting into the lineup because Cody Ceci was nursing a lower body injury. The Senators actually scored a power play goal and Hammond was brilliant even if it didn't always look pretty.
Cameron finally went with the strategy of creating a more balanced set of pairings, (Karlsson-Methot, Cowen - Wideman, Wiercioch - Borowiecki) and although the results were pretty atrocious defensively it could be partially attributed to the fact that it was the first time such pairings were used, or the fact that the best defenseman of the bottom 5 was unfortunately missing. Although Wideman did score, he was on for an astounding 24 more shot attempts against than for at even strength. The -24 almost double anyone else on the team (Hoffman was -13). Yet Wideman still ended up with a +1 rating, so sometimes some numbers do lie and he (along with the other 17 skaters) can thank Hammond for that.
And Wideman wasn't on the ice during the last two minutes where the Senators couldn't relieve the pressure without icing it as the Canes were relentless. Icing led to what it was supposed to do, punish the team that does it to slow things down by not letting them change their players. If Kyle Turris (50%) takes that draw with 35 seconds left, maybe it is a different ending, but we will never know.
In the end, the Senators were fortunate to come away with a point and on this night the better team won, although the Sens were so close to stealing 2 they could taste it which makes it a let-down. It is nothing to get too concerned about, because Carolina is like the Bermuda Triangle for Senators points and to come away with 1 is a bonus regardless of how these two teams are playing coming in.
For me it will be interesting to see what the blue line looks like when Ceci gets back.
Now its on to Music City to end the mini two game road trip with a Tuesday night visit to Mike Fisher and the Predators.