The Senators make their first foray out of the Eastern Time Zone this season for a date with the Nashville Predators.
This will be the second and final meeting of the season between the teams, following the Preds' 4-3 shootout win in Ottawa on Oct 17th. Special teams, and more precisely James Neal proved to be the Senators' undoing, as his pair of almost identical power play goals and his shootout winner were instrumental for Nashville coming away with the 2 points. Nashville went 2 for 6 with the man advantage while Ottawa was 0-for-2.
Both teams have been off since suffering losses on Saturday, with Ottawa falling in a shootout to Carolina and Nashville being shut out by St. Louis 4-0.
Judging from the lines at Senators' practice yesterday, Mike Hoffman and Shane Prince will swap spots, with Hoffman resuming his place beside Kyle Turris and Mark Stone while Price joins forces with Mika Zibanejad and Bobby Ryan. Not sure whether Zack Smith will draw back in or if he will continue to sit.
On the blue line there was good news as Cody Ceci proclaimed himself ready to go after missing Saturday with a lower body injury. His presence was greatly missed, although it looks like Chris Wideman will go back to the sidelines and Ceci will be paired with Patrick Wiercioch while Jared Cowen and Mark Borowiecki's heart-stopping tandem will be re-deployed.
Craig Anderson, who had back to back solid outings before giving Andrew Hammond the crease on Saturday, will be back between the pipes looking to avenge a mediocre performance against Nashville last time around, albeit one where he faced 41 shots.
Nashville has been great at home so far, with a 4-1-1 record, while the Senators have been road warriors with a 5-1-1 mark away from CTC, so something's gotta give. Either way, it is a pretty good bet that this will be a 1 goal game, as all 7 games they have played since the start of the 2010-11 season has been decided by that slimmest of margins, with 3 of them requiring extra time.
Whatever form the lineup takes, Ottawa has to do a better job at possessing the puck in the offensive zone. They have managed to be pretty successful this season playing rope-a-dope and relying on goaltending on a nightly basis, but that can only last so long and isn't a sound long-term strategy. Obviously that isn't the game plan that is drawn up, but taking steps to correct this issue as soon as possible will solve a lot of their problems.