Sens Fall 5-4 to Avs in Eventful Game

After the Sens left Vegas without a point despite deserving the win, the Sens were looking to remain above .500 with a win against a streaking Avalanche team. Curiously, Linus Ullmark was not the starter despite allegedly being healthy, with Anton Forsberg getting the nod, likely as a reward for his strong play shutting out Utah two games prior. Forsberg was strong, making 25 saves (and Ullmark made 2, more on that below), but it wasn't quite enough. Claude Giroux had a pair of goals, Brady Tkachuk and Nick Cousins also scored, and Thomas Chabot had two assists in the loss.

The first period was fairly quiet. The teams traded powerplays, with Colorado getting some higher quality chances, but nobody really took an edge. Late in the first, Nathan MacKinnon thought he'd taken the lead, but it was called back on goalie interference on Mikko Rantanen. Based on the standard set this season (as explained by Elliotte Friedman in last week's 32 Thoughts), it was the correct call. Rantanen entered the blue paint without being pushed and made contact with the goalie; that's no goal.

The teams nearly ended the first period tied, but a delayed penalty in the final minute gave the Avs some zone time, and a strong cycle allowed Nikolai Kovalenko to bury his first career goal.

The second period started as one of the weirdest periods of hockey I've watched in recent memory. First, after a 2 min shift for the whole Sens team, Travis Hamonic just iced the puck. Anton Forsberg went to the puck for a skate change, which I thought was just gamesmanship to get his team a breather, but then it took so long Linus Ullmark had to come in cold. On the ensuing play, Hamonic took Jake Sanderson's elbow to the back of his neck and stayed down; the good news is he was OK and stayed in the game after getting looked at. Forsberg came in after that stoppage, but then left again, so Ullmark had to come in cold again (and nearly gifted Casey Middelstadt a goal off a rebound). After a couple more minutes, Forsberg was back in his net. So that was 4 goaltending changes in just over 6 minutes of in-game play. Anyway, the rest of the second period happened, Thomas Chabot hit the post, then Tim Stützle was absolutely robbed:

And then wouldn't you know it, the Avs scored again in the final minute of the period, this time a shot from Josh Manson that trickled through. The Sens were down 2-0 after 2 thanks to two final-minute goals.

The third period felt like more of the same for the first 10 minutes. Colorado was the better team, and the Sens were just hanging on. Then Brady Tkachuk was in the right place to take advantage of a fortunate bounce to bring the Sens back within one:

And then Tim Stützle went fell "not on my watch", being a one-man zone entry, and then manning the point, forcing a juicy rebound on which Nick Cousins got to tuck in the game-tying goal.

After taking a bad penalty late last game, that was a nice recovery moment for Wayne Chezky in his 600th game. Sadly, the hope was short-lived, as first Logan O'Connor got prime position in front of the net to tip home a goal, and then Ross (no relation) Colton took advantage of Jake Sanderson having no clue where the puck was and put home his 8th (!!) of the young season. A 2–0 game became a 4–2 game in a real hurry. It wasn't done though, as, just as Ottawa was trying to pull the goalie, Claude Giroux snuck a hopper through the five-hole of Annunen.

And Ottawa did pretty well with the net empty, but MacKinnon is a force of nature, and when he got the chance, he outskated the whole Sens team and scored on the empty net. But then, with the goalie pulled again, Giroux scored again.

A wild one ended 5–4. The Sens nearly managed to pull this one despite looking like the worse team for most of the game, but there were definitely things to build on. Now let's hope some guys can get healthy.

My Thoughts:

• What's with that drop pass on the powerplay? Both defencemen would skate up hard, then drop the puck, kill all the momentum, and allow the Avs to stack the blue line to prevent the Sens from gaining entry. I'm really not a fan of this play, especially continuing to do it after it failed the first four times on the same powerplay.
• Michael Amadio started on the top line with Tkachuk and Stützle, but got moved to the third line as the game went on, with Nick Cousins getting that spot on the top line. Both feel odd to me, since they both have their strengths, but scoring isn't really either of their thing (game-tying goal by Cousins notwithstanding). Missing Perron and Pinto really exposes this team's lack of scoring depth.
• The second line (Batherson–Norris–Giroux) looked like our most dangerous forward line tonight. I have to say, it's been a nice surprise that Norris has been an effective top-six centre to start the year.
• Far too many times, the Sens got possession in their defensive zone and then gave it up, failing to clear. That sloppiness needs to get cleaned up real fast. A return of Artem Zub would definitely help.
• Parker Kelly looks effective as a PKer in Colorado. It's nice to see him land on his feet outside Ottawa.
• Nathan MacKinnon is really, really, really good. The Sens had no answer for him.

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