Once Upon A Time In Las Vegas – Wildcard Edition
The Ottawa Senators (19-20-3, 41 points, 7th Atlantic) are on the road Monday, when visiting the St Louis Blues (21-20-3, 45 points, 5th Central) at the Enterprise Center in St. Louis. Ottawa was defeated by the Colorado Avalanche 7-0 on Saturday and the Senators have lost three of the last four, while being outscored by a total of 23-7 and shut out twice. St Louis was defeated by the Tampa Bay Lightning 4-2 for its second straight loss and the Blues have been outscored 8-3 over those two games. Ottawa will play without Mathieu Joseph, Tyler Motte, Josh Norris and Artem Zub. St Louis will play without Robert Portuzzo, Logan Brown, Torey Krug, Ryan O'Reilly and VladimirTarasenko amongst others.
The Ottawa Senators are allowing an average of 3.26 goals per game which is 19th in the NHL. The Senators are allowing an average of 32.1 shots per game which is 21st. Ottawa’s penalty kill unit is 8th in the NHL, successfully holding opponents scoreless 81.9% of the time the Senators are short-handed. Anton Forsberg is 8-9-2 with a 3.25 goals against average, 902 save percentage and one shutout.
Ottawa is struggling on attack, as the Senators are scoring an average of just 2.95 goals per game which is 25th in the NHL. Ottawa is inefficient with its shots as the Senators are 6th, averaging 33.4 shots per game but just 25th in scoring. Ottawa’s power play is scoring 26.6% of the time the Senators are short-handed which is also 6th best in the league. Tim Stutzle is the leading goal scorer for Ottawa wi th 18, while Brady Tkachuk and Claude Giroux have each scored 15 goals. The leader in assists is Tkachuk with 26 and the left winger is the points leader with 41, while Stutzle has 39 points. Ottawa has scored 42 power play goals in 42 games.