UPDATE: The NHL is investigating the hit by Mark Stone on Landon Ferraro last night and Stone could face supplementary discipline.
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I said yesterday after Friday's win and before last night's game that Saturday night would be a good test to see if the Senators have really turned a corner.
Well, if they had, they turned back last night. The Senators were back to their inconsistent and frustrating ways, and their lack of efficiency on special teams, which I also alluded to yesterday, jumped up and bit them as they split their home and home with the Red Wings with a 5-3 home ice loss.
Ottawa went 0-for-3 with the man advantage while Detroit went 2-for-3, and that was the difference in the loss. Although it really wasn't that close as 2 late goals from the Senators made the final look more respectable after Detroit took a 5-1 lead to put the game out of reach by the 6 minute mark of the third.
You could point to any number of individual breakdowns, but the bottom line is Dave Cameron isn't getting his increased 5% from every player. It is the same group that is contributing - Kyle Turris, Mark Stone and now Bobby Ryan with Erik Karlsson contributing at one end while dropping the ball at the other.
Other than a 6 or 7 minute period at the end of the first where Ottawa dominated for a long stretch but came up empty against Petr Mrazek, they were thoroughly outplayed while the game was still in balance.
From Jared Cowen making a ridiculously bad pinch to allow Brendan Smith a breakaway from center ice (and was bailed out by Craig Anderson) to Anderson badly playing another short side play to put himself out of position and allow a 6X4 on the wraparound (we have seen that all too many times), to Erik Karlsson getting caught on a minute and a half shift with no energy to backcheck on what turned into a 4 on 1 that led to the 5-1 goal, it was an uneven effort.
There was the unfortunate bounce off of Jared Cowen's rear end, but that is just one of those goals that fluke in as Cowen was trying to clear his man from the front of the net and got hit by the shot. He was doing the right thing in that case and it was bad luck. But that was the goal that re-established a Wings 2 goal lead and the Senators couldn't come back from that.
Granted, the power play goal that put the Wings up 2-0 early in the second should never have happened. Credit a crafty play from Mrazek where the Wings goalie stuck his leg out to impede Chris Neil and the official just saw Mrazrk go down and flagged Neil for goaltender interference for giving the Wings the advantage, which they capitalized on.
As much as the Senators dominated the Wings on Friday, you have to give the Wings credit for turning the tables. There are 2 teams on the ice and Detroit asserted their will a night after they put in a performance to forget in front of their own fans.
It was a night for a couple of milestones, as Detroit captain Henrik Zetterberg notched both his 500th assist on the first goal and 800th point on the second. Kyle Turris' goal to make it 2-1 was his 100th career goal, and Bobby Ryan's goal was his 400th career point.
The performance was certainly not the one the Senators and their fans were looking for after the optimism created on Friday, which is very disappointing. Now they have to go into Montreal and face the league leading Habs on Tuesday night looking for hopefully a return of Hoffman and Lazar and a new level of consistency, something that has been tough to find early this season.
NOTE: Max McCormick was sent to Binghamton today, probably signifying that Hoffman will be ready for Tuesday.