By Nathan Eide -
via cdn.nhl.com
After that, it was all Ottawa. From that point on, the Senators outshot the Wild 17-16, including 10-5 in the second period, where Ottawa scored three times. Tied at three going into the third period, the Wild needed to come out, forecheck hard, be aggressive with the puck, take the zone with speed and force the game on the Senators like they did in the first period. However, none of that happened. Jarku Ruutu drew an interference penalty, and Daniel Alfredsson proceeded to go in shorthanded and put the Senators up 4-2 with the second shorty of the night for Ottawa. At that point, the Wild showed a tiny amount of resilience, but for the most part the Sens clamped down, played Wild hockey and sealed it with a Dany Heatley empty-netter amidst a chorus of boos.
The Wild lack a killer instinct. Is it Lemaire? Risebrough? The guys on the team? Who is at fault? What changes need to be made?
Hockey Wilderness Three Stars
Questions to Answer
Can the Wild shut-down the Heatley - Spezza - Aflredsson line? Nope. They did a good enough job early on to move Alfredsson to the second line, but then they got back together and broke through.
With this being a battle of two of the lowest scoring offenses in the NHL, I'm putting the over/under of total goals at 4. Which do you take? I was planning on the under, but it went way over.
Will the home-town crowd even react to Filip Kuba coming back? Not much from the crowd, but a nice bit by the FSN crew for Kuba.
Is Brian Elliott cut out to be an NHL goalie? No. He's just not that good.
Can the Senators just leave Jason Spezza here and take Niklas Backstrom and/or Kim Johnsson with them? Please? Seriously? We'll take any of the top three, and you can have Backstrom, Johnsson and Bergeron!
Notes
The Game In Pictures
via cdn.nhl.com
via d.yimg.com
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Game Highlights
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