GAME DAY: Ottawa Senators @ Los Angeles Kings - 10:30pm ET - Thu. Dec. 3rd, 2009 PLUS post game thoughts

The Ottawa Senators (13-8-4, 30 points, 3rd in the Northeast) continue their Western road trip and head to LA to visit the Kings (16-10-2, 34 points, 2nd in the Pacific) on Thursday night. The Sens are coming off a frustrating loss to Heatley and the San Jose Sharks. Sens Nation was hoping for a win and some blood after the turmoil that Heatley put them through this summer... but really, those were very high expectation against the best team in the league and the best line in the league. Heatley was held scoreless and Michalek showed why he's going to be a super star, so some good things did come of it. As for LA, they are a young team that is getting better and better with lots of talented kids getting some good chances to shine... they have been very dangerous this year and this should be a good test for the Sens. The Sens need their top guys to start producing consistently. Elliott has been playing well and needs to keep giving the team a chance to win. The Sens are missing a bit of sandpaper with Neil and Donovan out, so guys like Carkner and Fisher will have to step it up in their absence. GO SENS GO!!!

Game Coverage:
- TV: TSN (HD), FS-W (HD)
- Radio: Team 1200
- Web: check http://www.atdhe.net and http://www.justin.tv

Latest Updates:
- Elliott gets the start in goal
- Nick Foligno will be a healthy scratch
- Peter Regin will play in his place

Team Lineups:
Ottawa Senators: http://www.dailyfaceoff.com/team-lineups/ottawa-senators-team-lineup
Los Angeles Kings: http://www.dailyfaceoff.com/team-lineups/los-angeles-kings-team-lineup

TSN's Ice Chips:

Source: http://www.tsn.ca/nhl/feature/?id=11009

Ottawa Senators:

Lines at practice today:

Michalek - Spezza - Foligno
Kovalev - Fisher - Shannon
Ruutu - Kelly - Cheechoo
Regin - Winchester - Keller

Projected lines vs the LA Kings:

Forwards:
Michalek - Spezza - Alfredsson
Kovalev - Fisher - Shannon
Ruutu - Kelly - Cheechoo
Regin - Winchester - Keller

Defencemen:
Phillips - Volchenkov
Kuba - Karlsson
Picard - Carkner

Goaltenders:
Elliott
Brodeur

Injuries:
- Donovan (knee, on IR, out indefinitely)
- Leclaire (broken jaw, out 4 weeks)
- Neil (knee, expected to miss 1-2 weeks)

Los Angeles Kings:

The Kings were once again without D Rob Scuderi (lower body) and LW Ryan Smyth (upper body). Smyth is not expected to return until mid-December but Scuderi is close to returning, according to Head Coach Terry Murray. F Brandon Segal left the ice in the first period on Monday against Anaheim because of a lower-body injury and didn't return. - Orange County Register

Projected Lines vs the Sens:

Forwards:
Purcell - Kopitar - Williams
Frolov - Schenn - Brown
Parse - Handzus - Simmonds
Segal - Richardson - Ivanans

Defencemen:
Jones - Doughty
O'Donnell - Johnson
Drewiske - Greene

Goaltenders:
Quick
Ersberg

Injuries:
- Ryan Smyth (upper body, on IR, expected to miss 4 weeks)
- Andrei Loktionov (shoulder surgery, out 4 months)
- Rob Scuderi (lower body, missed Tuesday's game vs Anaheim)

Game Day Previews:

OttawaSenators.com Game Day Preview:

Source: http://senators.nhl.com/club/preview.htm?id=2009020407

NHL.com Game Day Preview:

Source: http://www.nhl.com/ice/preview.htm?id=2009020407

Sportsnet.ca Game Day Preview:

Source: http://www.sportsnet.ca/hockey/nhl/scores/20091203/Ott@LA/story

ESPN Game Day Preview:

Source: http://scores.espn.go.com/nhl/preview?gameId=291203008

ESPN Stats Comparison:



Media Links:
- Clouston post-practice presser from Thursday (MP3): http://bit.ly/8r5HmS
- Game Notes for tonight's game (PDF): http://bit.ly/7qrPXd
- Clouston post-practice presser from Wednesday (MP3): http://bit.ly/87bwS4
- Prospects Cowen and Wiercioch named to Canada's junior team selection: http://bit.ly/5jkc1w
- Web site story: Chemisty isn't always easily found: http://senators.nhl.com/club/news.htm?id=508299
- Clouston post-game presser from Tuesday night: http://bit.ly/8uOE6D
- SensTV On-line: http://senators.nhl.tv/team/console.jsp
- Official Twitter of the Ottawa Senators: http://twitter.com/NHL_Sens

Spread the word!

Follow GMHockey on Twitter: http://twitter.com/gmhockey

GO SENS GO!!!

Let's get this party started! Ice cold beers at the ready!

GO SENS GO!!!

Shabbs you should really figure out a way to do an RSS feed of your game day. I think a lot of people look for your post and you do a great job.

BTW...

As a suggestion, Cap'n and SpezzD... you should post a link on the home page to GMH's Twitter, Facebook and whatever social media that GMH has an official account associated to the site. Cross promotion through social media has been proven the fastest means of driving site membership and page views.

Thanks MOI!

Twitter it up!

http://twitter.com/GMHockey/status/6288228876

MurderOnIce wrote:Shabbs you should really figure out a way to do an RSS feed of your game day. I think a lot of people look for your post and you do a great job.

BTW...

As a suggestion, Cap'n and SpezzD... you should post a link on the home page to GMH's Twitter, Facebook and whatever social media that GMH has an official account associated to the site. Cross promotion through social media has been proven the fastest means of driving site membership and page views.

A good idea...I'll see if Clutch can do that quickly. He does most of the links etc.

As for RSS... you guys should be able to enable for the whole forum...

shabbs wrote:
Ottawa Senators:

Lines at practice today:

Michalek - Spezza - Foligno
Kovalev - Fisher - Shannon
Ruutu - Kelly - Cheechoo
Regin - Winchester - Keller

Projected lines vs the LA Kings:

Forwards:
Michalek - Spezza - Alfredsson
Foligno - Fisher - Kovalev
Ruutu - Kelly - Cheechoo
Shannon - Winchester - Shannon

Defencemen:
Phillips - Volchenkov
Kuba - Karlsson
Picard - Carkner

Goaltenders:
Elliott
Brodeur

I'm gonna go ahead and dispute that...Besides the obvious fact that Shannon will not become two people, I'm thinking the Shannon-Fisher-Kovalev line from the San Jose game will remain intact. 1st line'll surely be the same and the 3rd line might, but Foligno or Keller would fit great on the wing occupied by Cheechoo. Putting Keller there also gives you the benefit of pairing Foligno and Winchester, who've looked awesome everytime they've played together and also play a similar, hard-nosed stye. Adding Cheechoo to Winchester's wing finally gives Jesse a player to pass the puck to and Cheech a player who can get him the puck in the places he can still use it...

My lines would definitely be:

Michalek-Spezza-Alfredsson
Shannon-Fisher-Kovalev
Ruutu-Kelly-Keller
Foligno-Winchester-Cheechoo

add in our perfectly constructed D-pairings and we're ready to roll!

Regin needs to draw back in or go to Bingo. Enough is probably enough.

Dung Regin on that wing would be great too...problem is I want to give Keller a chance to prove he can play...another game or two should be enough, but Regin is an NHLer...I'm really not sure why they're using him the way they are. It's pretty confusing.

My bad... copy/paste typo... fixed now.

GAME DAY!

GO SENS GO!!!

does anybody know what's ha[ened with oscar moller this year?

shabbs wrote:As for RSS... you guys should be able to enable for the whole forum...

How do we do that? I don't mind doing it for sure.

Cap'n Clutch wrote:

shabbs wrote:As for RSS... you guys should be able to enable for the whole forum...

How do we do that? I don't mind doing it for sure.

Actually, it looks like it's already enabled...

http://www.gmhockey.com/rss

That link should launch your RSS reader and give users access to RSS feeds for the forums.

MOI - give it a spin.

EDIT: it does not seem to be pulling in all the individual sub-forums (each team's forum for example)... I'll keep poking around.