Sens Get Outplayed By Hurricanes in 4-0 Loss
Not a fun game!
We just can’t have nice things in November in Ottawa, can we?
No matter how much things might change, they still stay the same. This team is legitimately good - their underlying numbers have just about every analytics website giving them a very good chance of making the playoffs - but the points haven’t quite backed it up. They can dominate play but find a way to lose one night, then get thoroughly outplayed the next. It’s only November, obviously, but why can’t we have a good November one of these days? It’s all I’m asking for.
The Sens spent a good chunk of the first period trying to emulate the Flyers’ strategy from Thursday’s game. They seemed to have no interest in touching the puck, content to sit back and let their goaltender do all the work. Maybe Ullmark’s problem was that he faced so few shots that he got bored. The Sens were just kindly making sure that that didn’t happen to Forsberg tonight.
Predictably, Carolina got ahead early, off a weird angle shot that Forsberg probably should have had. Guess that new strategy of letting him face a lot of shots didn’t work. 1-0 Carolina.
Ottawa got some reprieve after the goal when Tim Stützle did his civic duty by dramatically falling to the ice, prompting the entire crowd to boo him. The powerplay did everything but score, and then it was right back to Carolina being the better team by far, and to make things even worse, Nick Cousins took a dumb penalty.
The Sens killed it off, and managed to hold on for the rest of the first period. All things considered, they were lucky to only be losing by one.
The second period brought more of the same. Ottawa was clearly outmatched the whole time. Tim Stützle did manage to score a goal in one of the rare instances where the Sens got the puck, but it was instantly called off because he had apparently done a little bit of slashing before scoring the goal, or something. I can’t tell you if he did slash anyone, because the broadcast never showed the replay of that part, so I’m going to go ahead and assume he did nothing wrong and that the refs are trying to prevent the Sens from winning the cup.
The refs called another bad penalty on Pinto right at the end of the second period, and then the Sens got confused counting to four (happens to the best of us) and got slapped with a too many men penalty. Carolina went up 2-0 with literally one second left in the Pinto penalty, meaning that they were still on the powerplay. You can’t make this stuff up.
Naturally, the Hurricanes scored on the second powerplay too, right at the start of the third period. Sure. Why not? 3-0 Carolina.
Ottawa managed to put together a nice push after falling behind by three, with Stützle walking around the entire opposing team multiple times. It was an impressive effort, but not good enough, as the goaltender turned away all of Ottawa’s shots and the Hurricanes got a few chances of their own.
An empty net goal with five minutes left in the game was the final nail in the coffin. 4-0 Carolina.
In the dying seconds, Tim Stützle pulled off one of the most impressive spin-o-ramas I’ve ever seen, but Brady Tkachuk couldn’t handle the pass, and the Sens got shut out for the first time all season.
At the end of the day, we need to remember that the Carolina Hurricanes are a very good hockey team. They have, specifically, been the best possession team in the league for a very long time. As frustrating as this was, it was a scheduled loss, and this team is going to be fine. Probably. I think.
Game Notes
- To say that Tim Stützle was all over the ice would be a massive understatement. He’s such a dynamic player, and with a few good bounces this easily could have been a “Stützle puts the team on his back and carries them to victory” type of game. What a player. I’m in awe.
- The people who officiated this game should sleep with one eye open tonight.
- Honestly, I’m just going to leave it at that. A bad game all-around for the Sens, except for Tim Stützle, who was in a completely different stratosphere from anyone else on the ice, on either team. So much so that it feels wrong to put anyone else in this list with him. We’ve got two days off before the next game, so everyone please spend that time thinking about how grateful you are that the Ottawa Senators selected third overall in 2020.
