Game 46 preview: Ottawa Senators @ San Jose Sharks

The Ottawa Senators will look to win consecutive games for the first time in over six weeks when they visit the San Jose Sharks tonight. Since following up a 4-3 win over the Blackhawks with a 3-2 win over the Islanders, the Senators have gone 0-7-0 in games following a victory and were outscored 32-11 in those games. The Sharks have won five in a row to jump into third place in the Pacific Division. Curiously, while they are 15-6-2 on the road, they are only 8-12-0 at home.

Max McCormick will replace Shane Prince who will be a healthy scratch. On the bright side, the Senators are expected to move Mike Hoffman to the top line to replace Bobby Ryan. Hip hip hooray! Hip hip hooray! Hip hip hooray! Here are the full lines from yesterday's skate courtesy of Sylvain St-Laurent.

Hoffman - Turris - Stone
Michalek - Zibanejad - Ryan
Lazar - Pageau - Chiasson
McCormick - Smith - Neil

Claesson - Karlsson
Wiercioch - Ceci
Methot - Borowiecki

Anderson (starter)
Hammond

Some notes for tonight:

• How unexpected was that win on Saturday? Outshot 26-12 through the first two periods, and then to allow an early goal in the third to fall behind by two goals, and then to come back and win? Goodness gracious.
• Mark Borowiecki is now only one point behind Patrick Wiercioch!
• In 273 minutes of Kyle Turris and Bobby Ryan together, the Senators get 47.6% of the 5-on-5 shot attempts. In 416 minutes of Turris without Ryan, the Senators get 52.4% of the shot attempts. The Senators really had one good line earlier in the season, but without Hoffman, they were starting to have none. Hopefully the HST line remains a thing for the foreseeable future.
• The Senators won the game, but just as importantly, Erik Karlsson got a secondary assist to take his points total to 46.
• Mika Zibanejad has had five multi-point games this year and two of them have been against Los Angeles.
• The Senators beat the Sharks in Ottawa 4-2 exactly one month ago from today.
• Alex Chiasson returned to the lineup to score his first goal in over two months. It was his first even strength goal of the season.
• The Senators are 10-5-1 against the Western Conference and only 11-13-5 against the Eastern Conference. Including tonight, they have 12 games left against the West and 25 against the East.
• After scoring just seven goals in regulation in their previous seven games, the Senators scored five against Los Angeles.
• The 186 shots on goal by Brent Burns are 43 more than any other defenceman. Karlsson is eighth with 121./