Round 3, Game 6 preview: Pittsburgh Penguins @ Ottawa Senators

A preview of the game between the Ottawa Senators and the Pittsburgh Penguins on May 23, 2017

After a horrendous performance on Sunday afternoon, the Sens hope to turn the page as they come back home to try and force a game seven. Without question, this is the biggest game of the year for the Sens and it's the first time they have faced elimination this year.

Game five was one to forget for the Sens, where they were dismantled by the whole Penguins squad. Heading into that game, the big story was how the Sens had managed to limit the Penguins chances. Pittsburgh then followed it up by lighting up the Sens for seven goals in which 11 different skaters for the Penguins had at least a point

Guy Boucher teased us with a potential major lineup change by having Colin White take the warm-up in game five before choosing to roll with seven defencemen. Lines and pairings for game six are still unconfirmed at this point, but according to coach Guy Boucher this morning, Colin White and Chris Kelly are expected to take the warmup and Ryan Dzingel is back in. He also mentioned that there is a 50/50 chance he will roll with 7 defencemen again. Here are the expected lines at this point, game-time decisions are in brackets.

MacArthur - Turris - Ryan
Brassard- Smith - Stone
Hoffman - Pageau - Pyatt
Stalberg - (White/Kelly) - Dzingel

Methot - Karlsson
Phaneuf - Ceci
Claesson - Wideman
(Harpur)

Anderson (starter)
Condon

Some notes for tonight:

  • The Sens gave up 7 or more goals only twice this season. On both occasions, the Senators bounced back and won the following game.
  • The Sens powerplay continues to struggle, failing to score on their last 29 powerplays.
  • One of the more stranger stats since the 2014-15 playoffs, when a team scores at least seven goals in a game, they have gone on to win the series only once out of four times.
  • Craig Anderson had a birthday to forget on Sunday. He became the first goalie since Martin Brodeur in 2012 to start a playoff game on his birthday.
  • In this year's regular season and playoffs, the Sens bounced back and won the next game after being shutout four out of five times. Hopefully the shutout loss will have the same effect on the Sens in game six.
  • After losing three straight game sixes heading into this playoff season, the Sens have won back-to-back game sixes this year.
  • You can catch tonight's game at 8:00pm ET on NBCSN, CBC, TVAS

Here are some stats for the two teams tonight. All stats are from NHL.com except Corsi and Fenwick are from PuckOn.net

Category

Ottawa

Pittsburgh

Player

#

Player

#

Goals

Jean-Gabriel Pageau

8

Jake Guentzel

9

Assists

Erik Karlsson

13

Evgeni Malkin

17

Points

Erik Karlsson

15

Evgeni Malkin

23

Shots

Mike Hoffman

47

Phil Kessel

49

Average Ice time

Erik Karlsson

27:29

Brian Dumoulin

21:18

Category

Ottawa

Pittsburgh

#

Rank

#

Rank

Goals For

2.53

9th

3.18

1st

Goals Against

2.71

10th

2.35

6th

Shots For

30.3

10th

28.6

14th

Shots Against 31.4 10th 33.0 13th
Zone, score and venue adjusted Corsi % 50.1% 7th 47.4% 13th
Zone, score and venue adjusted Fenwick % 50.4% 6th 48.9% 9th

Not everyone can afford to pay for sports coverage right now, and that is why we will keep as much of the site's content free for as long as we can.


But if you are able to, please consider subscribing to help keep our articles free (and get a few extra perks).

Erik Condra
  • Ability to comment and participate in our community
  • Twice monthly newsletter available only to subscribers
  • Ad-free reading
  • Our undying love and appreciation
Brady Tkachuk
  • Everything from the Erik Condra tier
  • 10% discount on all merch
  • Access to any future paywalled content
  • A personal thank-you from the Silver Seven staff
Daniel Alfredsson
  • Everything from the Brady Tkachuk tier
  • Inner peace knowing you are supporting quality, independent coverage of your favourite sports team