Takeaways: The Senators’ elite units haven’t been particularly noteworthy.
On a penalty shot, Brady Tkachuk of the Ottawa Senators is stopped by Carolina Hurricanes goalie Pyotr Kochetkov. Content of the Canadian Press Article
For the Ottawa Senators, being seated in the Eastern Conference basement is not ideal.
It shouldn’t either.
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However, the Senators must drastically strengthen their special teams if they hope to escape this predicament before they kick off a five-game road trip at the Enterprise Center on Thursday night against the St. Louis Blues.
Following a 0-for-4 power play effort in a 4-1 home defeat to the Carolina Hurricanes on Tuesday, the Senators began the morning ranked No. 22 in the NHL with a 17.5% success rate. Worse, at No. 31, the club is ranked second-last on the penalty kill.
hose two areas have to be better if the Senators are to stand any hope of making the playoffs.
Centre Josh Norris was blunt when describing the club’s effort on the power play against the Hurricanes. The Senators only registered four shots with the man advantage on those attempts.
“S***. It’s brutal,” a frustrated Norris said. “Excuse my language.”
The Senators had two power plays to start the second, couldn’t capitalize on either of them and that allowed the Hurricanes to take over the game. The power play actually killed any momentum the Senators might have been able to get from it.
“You’ve got to stay with it. So you don’t score, you’ve got to find a way to keep grinding,” coach D.J. Smith said. “You’re 1-1 with eight or nine minutes left in the second period. They score a power-play goal, it deflated us, but you’ve still got to be able to rebound, which we didn’t do.”
Smith said the power play, which had two goals Saturday in a 5-1 win over the Detroit Red Wings, has to be more consistent.
“We got a little frustrated. We had a couple of looks early, it didn’t go, but that’s a really good penalty killing team. You can’t be frustrated, they’re one of the tops in the league every year. They’re going to pressure you and you’ve got to understand they’re going to make the plays,” Smith said
Before leaving town, the Senators made a few roster changes.
Before leaving for St. Louis on Wednesday, the team sent winger Jiri Smejkal back to its AHL affiliate in Belleville. Defenseman Jacob Larsson was called up to travel with the team.
Mark Kicastel, the center, is getting closer to playing again after missing 13 games due to a high ankle injury as a result of the decision to send Smejkal down. For the first time since sustaining the injury on November 2 against the Los Angeles Kings, he skated this week wearing a contact jersey.
Earlier this week, Kastelic told reporters he thought he was ready to play, but he added he needed the medical staff’s approval first. It might not be effective.
