Josh Norris and Zack MacEwan Lead the Way in Wild Sens Win

How’s that for some Thanksgiving fun? The Ottawa Senators and Los Angeles Kings both put on a show offensively, while also playing some miserable defensive hockey. They seemed to agree to make this game one to remember. The best way to achieve that? Dominance on the power play mixed with lacklustre goaltending. In the end, Josh Norris scored the game’s 15th goal in overtime to end this game,8-7 for the Sens. Let’s dive into the details.

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Déjà Vu in Net for the Senators

All of last season, the Senators struggled to find any type of consistency from their goaltenders. Steve Staios addressed that in the offseason by trading for Linus Ullmark. Problem solved right? Well, not exactly. Ullmark had to sit out with some sort of injury. Apparently, it’s not anything to be concerned about, but for at least one game, Senators fans were brought right back to the painful goaltending struggles of a season ago. It started with Anton Forsberg giving up three goals on nine shots. He had to leave the game part way through the second, but the struggles continued.

Mads Sogaard gave up four goals on 16 shots. This can’t continue like this all season. Ullmark can’t play every game. Whether it’s Forsberg, Sogaard, or someone else entirely, the Senators need more from their back-up goalie. It’s not even a matter of making the highlight saves. Just don’t suck the life out of the team with goal against after goal against. On the bright side, the Senators did a great job fighting back all game long, despite the shaky goaltending.

MacEwan the Sniper

I’ve theorized in the past that MacEwan is a skilled player trapped in the body and role of a goon. He knows he’s supposed to fight and hit to stick around at the NHL level. Every now and then, though, he shows some offensive ability. It usually doesn’t result in actual goals, though, as he scored just two goals all of last season. Today, he matched that total in under six minutes of ice-time. By no means were they highlight reel goals, but they were huge in keeping the Senators in this game. Add in a fight and some big hits and you have a phenomenal fourth line game from MacEwan.

Penalty Kill Disaster

The Senators had to fight through the loss of three important penalty killers- Ullmark, Ridly Greig, and Artem Zub. The first two sat out with injuries while Zub left early after a big hit from Tanner Jeannot. In the end, the replacements were not up for the task. The Senators penalty kill, simply put, stunk. They gave up three goals on five attempts, putting them at a 40% success rate. Here’s what I saw on the penalty kill: Too passive, and bad goaltending. Okay, I’ll give the Kings a little credit, that Kopitar guy is pretty good. One the bright side, the Senators somehow had the better of the two penalty kills.

Power Play Dominance

The Senators scored four power play goals on six opportunities. It was great to watch not just the goals, but the movement, the different types of goals, and different goal scorers. Before the game, if you asked me who needed a goal to get them going, I would’ve been torn between Giroux, Batherson and of course Josh Norris. Well, how about all three of them scoring with the man advantage, plus Jake Sanderson with an absolute rocket. Eight different Senators had at least one power play point. The most promising part of all has to be Josh Norris. He was such a weapon with the man advantage a full years ago. If he can start sniping like that again, this could once again be a top 10 unit league wide.

 Additional Notes

It’s hard to end this article. So much happened! On the Kings side, leaving Kuemper in for all eight goals was rough. Especially when the broadcast was talking about him being a Team Canada option in net for the Four Nations Tournament in February. It was so great to see the top players step up in this one after a sleepy game against Montreal. Stützle, Norris, Batherson, Tkachuk, Chabot and Sanderson all had multi-point games. Chabot ate up almost 30 minutes of ice-time, too. The next player I need to see make an impact: David Perron. Hopefully that comes Thursday against the Devils.