OTTAWA — Thursday’s drubbing at the hands of the Colorado Avalanche was a flashback to a time Ottawa Senators fans had hoped was permanently in the past.
Untimely goals, chaos in their own end, and being outplayed in an important game.
There are many ways to write “worst game of the season.” But sometimes it’s not just that you lost but how.
“There’s definitely a lot of things that we need to work on and improve on,” said Brady Tkachuk following the loss. “But I think at this point in the season, there’s no panic.”
He’s right. It’s one awful game. But nothing about Thursday’s 5-1 loss inspires less panic, just more of it for a fanbase in search of breaking a playoff curse.
This season the Senators have been more up and down than a bouncy castle. Ottawa has had both three winning and three losing streaks of over five games this season. After losing to Montreal in their previous game, it’s paramount for the Senators to keep this streak at two consecutive losses and nothing more.
However, Thursday’s performance was coming. The deceptive part of the Senators’ hot start to March was they were winning with offence but not defence. Finally, they were burned, allowing nine goals in back-to-back periods between the third period against Montreal (two of which were empty netters) and the first period versus Colorado.
Their coach believes the struggles defensively are multilayered.
“That’s not easy to just pinpoint,” said coach Travis Green when asked about the areas of recent defensive struggles. “We weren’t very good with the puck. Missed some passes, some breakout passes that stalled us from getting up the ice.”
The Senators had been using offence to be their best defence, needing to be resilient coming back to win four times in March. But that strategy catches up to every team eventually.
The Avalanche busted Thursday’s game open by beating the Senators to pucks all over the ice, scoring four goals in the first period. Some of it was great plays by Nathan MacKinnon and Cale Makar but there were also terrible defensive breakdowns that crept back into the Senators’ game.
MacKinnon’s magic beat Linus Ullmark on a shot that the goaltender will want back to open the scoring. Seconds later, Thomas Chabot chased after his own dump-in, which Colorado countered quickly for an odd-man rush that ended Brock Nelson scoring on a mini-breakaway. Even after Makar made it 3-0 on a power play, the game was still faintly within reach, until Ottawa lost Joel Kiviranta off a faceoff allowing him to rip around a shot to beat Ullmark, 4-0. Game over.
Since March 1, the Senators had gone 7-1-1 before Colorado’s onslaught. Ottawa had been giving up three goals against per game this month entering play Thursday. In the first five months of the season they were allowing 2.76 goals per game.
When you take a look under the hood it becomes more worrisome.
Look at their defensive splits before and after March 1.
Statistics courtesy of Natural Stat Trick
Meanwhile, despite Ullmark’s outstanding heroics in a couple of recent games, most notably his 48-save performance against Detroit, his numbers have otherwise been average. Ullmark has a .889 save percentage, 3.55 goals against average and a negative-2.55 goals save above expected, according to Natural Stat Trick, since the 4 Nations Face-Off break. It hasn’t been entirely Ullmark’s fault, but he had two subpar games in a row and his team lost both times. Allowing four goals on nine shots isn’t enough for Ullmark, who was pulled in the first period against the Avalanche.
“Well, I think there’s probably a couple goals that he’d like to have,” Green said about his goaltender’s performance. “He’s played a lot of hockey for us. He’s going to be great for us again.”
Another issue that arose against the Avalanche was that the Senators’ penalty kill could be picked apart. Ottawa had killed 12 straight penalties until late in the Canadiens game but they allowed two more goals on Thursday, including when nobody tracked Brock Nelson in front, allowing him to tip home his second of the game.
Ottawa’s penalty kill formation prioritizes a box formation where the middle of the ice is taken away. The downside is that opponents can penetrate the formation by breaking down the zone through passes. It’s happened on many occasions this season, including on the Nelson goal. Ottawa is 24th in the league high-danger goals allowed per 60 minutes at 8.68, according to Natural Stat Trick. That’s one reason the Senators have the 20th-ranked penalty kill in the league.
One player who benefited from the poor start against the Avalanche was newly acquired Fabian Zetterlund, who got his first chance to play with Tkachuk and Tim Stutzle. Zetterlund had multiple chances in his elevated role but couldn’t connect. What will be interesting to see is what sticks now that Green has brought out the blender with line combinations.
The Senators have been streaky for better or for worse all season. Good teams lose two in a row, but it’s extremely hard to make the playoffs with multiple lengthy losing streaks. A playoff cushion can only last so long.
