Game #5 Hub: Tampa Bay Lightning vs Ottawa Senators

What version of the Ottawa Senators will we see today?

The tight-checking team who made an appearance against the New Jersey Devils on Thursday? Or the high-flying squad that ran roughshod over the Los Angeles Kings on Monday?

Today's contest starts at 1:00pm ET – like Monday's game against LA – but I imagine we'll find ourselves somewhere in the middle as Travis Green and the Sens coaching staff continues to make adjustments to their structure.

Here's how the Senators lined up at practice yesterday; we're unsure as of now whether Anton Forsberg or Linus Ullmark will be in goal:

Travis Green noted that that Shane Pinto and Thomas Chabot should be good to go today, and it'll be interesting to see how the forwards all slot in. By the looks of things, the successful Perron - Pinto - Amadio line will be split up to try to spread their energy throughout the lineup, while keeping the duos of Pinto - Perron, Tkachuk - Stutzle, and Norris - Batherson together. Over at The Hockey News, friend Graeme Nichols illuminated some good insight into the rationale behind these changes from interviews with Perron and Amadio:

"(Extending offensive zone time)'s been a big emphasis from the coaching staff this year," Amadio said. "How do we create more zone time? That's what we've been trying to work on through camp, and it'll be a focus for us throughout the year. Keep our details good, make sure we're keeping the puck alive in the o-zone, and trying to (keep the opposition) down there."

Perron echoed Amadio's comments about getting away from being a one-and-done team.

"The mentality of teams that are one-and-done, it seemed like something that was talked about here in the past, but you're trying to score every shift. It's not that you're not trying to score, but you have to do the right thing. The team's identity, the structure of the team (have to be sound), and then that will create offence.

"You can't just be forcing things all over the ice. You wind up getting wide on the outside on the perimeter. You end up not creating as much, and maybe one line will do it and be successful at it, but there's no way a team can win the Stanley Cup or be a successful team doing that in the long run."

The 2020 and 2021 Stanley Cup Champions are coming off of a 4-3 win against Vegas on Thursday, and ran these lines at practice yesterday:

We're unsure if Andrei Vasilevskiy or Jonas Johansson will be in net.

Game Notes

• The Lightning are healthy, and feature quite a different roster than last year. Steven Stamkos has been replaced by Jake Guentzel, Conor Geekie and Cam Atkinson are new to the top-nine, and like many teams, they've got a brand new fourth line.
• So far, the team's top-six is clicking on all fronts, with the second line crushing the possession battle while the top-line scores the goals. In contrast, the bottom-six is being crushed so far and it'll be interesting to see if the Sens' centre depth can take advantage of some favourable home ice matchups against Conor Geekie or Luke Glendening.
• JJ Moser is Victor Hedman's new partner, while Ryan McDonagh returns in place of Mikhail Sergachev, who the Sens will face next week in Utah. Prospect Emil Lilleberg is the newest Bolts prospect to secure a spot in the lineup.
• As expected, the McDonagh and Erik Cernak pair has been getting shutdown minutes, so expect them to see a lot of Tim Stützle this afternoon.
• Travis Green spoke yesterday about being happy with the structure the team played with against New Jersey, but indicated that he's wanting to make some tweaks up front. Yesterday's practice lines reflect that, and it'll be interesting to see how they fare.
• Linus Ullmark shared that he was happy to be on the ice with his teammates again yesterday, with Green noting he was a full participant in practice. We got more confirmation that his injury is one that could turn into a long-term issue if he's pushed too far – Ullmark used the example of making a spread eagle save being something that could lead to that – but it remains to be seen whether this will continue to be managed or if the team's medical staff will wait until he's 100%. It sounds like if the Forsberg/Søgaard tandem had another Kings-type game on Thursday, Ullmark would've been in tonight, but given that Forsberg played well overall, they might continue to prioritize their starter's recovery. We'll see!

If you're attending the game, arrive early if you can and have fun! For those of us watching at home, you can catch the broadcast on Sportsnet (CAN-EN), RDS (CAN-FR), and Bally Sports Sun (USA-EN).