Game Day - Senators @ Leafs, 7:00PM, Saturday, Movember 12, 2011

VS
Who: Ottawa Senators @ Toronto Maple Leafs
When: Saturday, November 12, 2011 @ 7:00PM
Where: CBC

The Story:

This is the third meeting this season between the Ontario rivals, with the two teams splitting the series so far. The Sens dropped the first meeting October 8 in Toronto 6-5, but came out with a 3-2 win at home October 30. For the math majors out there, both teams have scored and allowed 8 goals, and the home team has won. With this game taking place in Toronto, and Toronto being the better team this season, it would seem that they are the favourite.

Game 1: The Sens went into the 3rd period down 4-0 and made this one interesting as the two teams combined for 7 goals in the 3rd. Kessel's 3 goals and 1 assist earned him the 1st star. Phaneuf (1A) and Alfredsson (2G) rounded out the final two stars.

Game 2: The Sens allowed the first goal but scored 3 unanswered, with Kaspars Daugavins first career NHL goal proving to be the winner. Karlsson (1A), Smith (1A) and MacArthur (2G) were the 3 stars.

Senators (7-9-1)

The Senators losing streak extended to 5 games with a 5-1 loss in Buffalo last night. The Sens have only earned 1 point in their last 5 games, with the lone point coming in an OTL to Buffalo. Despite the loss, the Sens remain 3rd in the Northeast and 10th in the conference.

Craig Anderson lasted only 2:25 into the 1st after he allowed 2 goals on 6 shots.

Spezza and Karlsson each provided an assist to add to their team leads in points and assists (respectively). The Sens lone goal came from Sergei Gonchar's 1st period powerplay marker.

Team Leaders:

Goals: Milan Michalek (10)
Assists: Erik Karlsson (14)
Points: Jason Spezza (17)
PIMs: Zenon Konopka (61)
+/-: Peter Regin (3)

Players-to-Watch:

Daniel Alfredsson has 68 (31-37) pts in 71 games vs. Toronto and had 2 goals in the last meeting.

Jason Spezza has 51 (14-37) in 48 games vs. the Leafs, going pointless last game.

Starting Line-up:

Colin Greening - Jason Spezza - Milan Michalek
Nick Foligno - Stephane Da Costa - Daniel Alfredsson
Kaspars Daugavins - Zack Smith - Condra
Zenon Konopka - Jesse Winchester - Bobby Butler

Chris Phillips - Brian Lee
Filip Kuba - Erik Karlsson
Jared Cowen - Sergei Gonchar

Craig Anderson

Injuries:

Chris Neil, Matt Carkner, Peter Regin

Leafs (10-5-1)

The Leafs are riding a 1 game winning streak. Their last game was a 3-2 win in St. Louis on Thursday. They are 1st in the Northeast and 2nd in the conference.

Phil Kessel is the NHL leader in both points (23) and goals (12).

Team Leaders:

Goals: Phil Kessel (12)
Assists: Phil Kessel (11)
Points: Phil Kessel (23)
PIMs: Mike Brown (26)
+/-: Phil Kessel (9)

Players-to-Watch:

Phil Kessel has to be the guy to watch, with 27 points (18-9) in 33 games vs. Ottawa and 2 goals and 5 points in his last 5 games.

Clarke MacArthur has only 2 pts (2G's) and is a -2 in his last 5, but had 2 goals in the Leaf loss in Ottawa.

Starting Line-up:

Joffrey Lupul - Tyler Bozak - Phil Kessel
Clarke MacArthur - Mikhail Grabovski - Nikolai Kulemin
Matthew Lombardi - Dave Steckel - Matt Frattin
Mike Brown - Philippe Dupuis - Joey Crabb

Carl Gunnarsson - Dion Phaneuf
John-Michael Liles - Mike Komisarek
Jake Gardiner - Luke Schenn

Ben Scrivens

Injuries:

Tim Connolly, James Reimer, Colby Armstrong

Sens have lost 5 straight... this is a perfect time to break out of their slump. Awwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww yyyyyyyyyeeeeeeeeeeeeaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!!!!

GO SENS GO!!!

Scrivens confirmed for the Leafs tonight.

https://twitter.com/#!/jonasTSN1050/status/135381661750804480

Thanks. I am editing as we go here, so if you post any changes I will try to work them in.

Another Dash GDT -- Noooooooooooooo!

wprager wrote:Another Dash GDT -- Noooooooooooooo!

Hehehe... it's a gift, what can I say.

Dash, Spezza has 17 points, Karlsson 14 assists, Konopka 61 PIMs.

The Sens only have 3 players withi a plus-rating: Regin (+3) and Filatov (+1) are not playing, which leaves only Smith (+1).

Condra has zero PIMs; Phillips took his first minor last night. That's pretty awesome, actually.

Craig Anderson now leads the league in games played (for goalies). I guess that's to be expected when your backup has the league-worst SV%. I mean *absolutely* the worst of all 65 goalies who have recorded stats in the NHL this year. *WORST* And, among the top 30 goalies in games played this season (i.e. the #1s, more or less) Anderson sports the third-worst SV%. That's embarrassing, and it makes it all the worst because when Anderson was signed, there was Pierre McGuire saying how it was a mistake to sign him after such a short audition for such a long term at that cap hit.

Seriously, at what point will they say enough is enough and bring up Lehner? I'm not saying for the rest of the season, but just to shake things up, why not bring him up for the road trip and tell the other two to get it figured out?

I'm not going to blame them for giveaways like Gonchar's and Rundblad's in the Rangers game, but, frankly, you kind of half-expect your #1 to bail your D-men out once in a while on plays like that, and it just hasn't happened. Also, quite frankly, our defense is playing much better than they did last year -- Kuba and Phillips and even Gonchar are all playing better (defensively); Cowen is an upgrade over Campoli and you can't forget Karlsson's improvement: -6 through the first 8 games, he was +4 through the next 8, until last night's -3 setback.

Our goaltending *has* to be better.

Ah, I see you updated the team stats while I was ranting about our goaltending.

Yeah I eventually get to it, I just copy and paste the previous game and work from there.

Komisarek and Lupul both good to go tonight.

Leafs scratches vs. Sens: Armstrong (ankle,) Reimer (U. Body,) Connolly (U. Body.) Healthy: Rosehill, Orr, Franson.

Leafs lines vs. Sens:

Lupul - Bozak - Kessel
MacArthur - Grabovski - Kulemin
Lombardi - Steckel - Frattin
Brown - Dupuis - Crabb

Gunnarsson - Phaneuf
Liles - Komisarek
Gardiner - Schenn

Scrivens (Gustavsson backs up)

SensReporter: Anderson first off the ice for the Senators.

Go Sens, let's break this BS losing streak!

Lee is playing. Loss.

Edited the line-ups in the original post to reflect the changes:

Brian Lee in, Rundblad out; Scrivens and Anderson both confirmed to start.

Peggy wrote:Lee is playing. Loss.

Not surprised, Rundblad out I assume. That boy needs to get his head screwed on straight.