A Call For Defense After a Senators’ High-Scoring Loss Monday

The Ottawa Senators return to work Wednesday in advance of their three-game road trip which opens in Dallas Friday. It’ll be the team’s first extended trip away from the confines of the Canadian Tire Centre this season. The Senators have played five of their opening six games on home ice, earning victories in two and possess a 2-4-0 record overall.

With any puck-luck, the club could easily be 4-2-0. The Senators ran into a hot goaltender in San Jose Sharks James Reimer last Thursday. Reimer who’s personal mark climbed to 16-6-3 versus Ottawa, stopped 30 shots en route to a tight 2-1 win.

Saturday afternoon was another story. Leading 2-0 over the New York Rangers with under six minutes remaining, the Senators in what could only be called a monumental collapse dropped a 3-2 decision to the Blue Shirts.

A sequence of events starting with a neck injury suffered by Matt Murray in a collision with Rangers’ Chris Kreider as he directed the puck past the Senators’ goalie was a contributing factor in the loss. 

As much as these pair of losses were disappointing, Senators head coach D.J. Smith was most upset by the way his team came out of the gate in Monday’s 7-5 defeat to the Washington Capitals.

While there was a lot to like in Monday’s tilt, led by Drake Batherson‘s hat trick and career high four points; clawing back from a 4-1 deficit to tie in the second period; Smith was critical of his team’s play.

“We weren’t ready to play out of the gate. We didn’t track hard enough. Their big players made us pay. (T.J.) Oshie gets three, (Alex) Ovechkin two. Unbelievable effort to make it 4-4. But we made some really bad plays by some guys in front our net,” said the Senators head coach.

“I think they (the Capitals) had three or four goals tonight off faceoffs that we didn’t execute. You have guys like Oshie and Ovechkin, we can’t make those mistakes. We did a lot of really good things offensively. But you can’t go tit-for-tat – a valiant effort by us in the second, then we bring it withing one in the third. We killed a penalty, then left Ovechkin open.”

Without singling out any particular individuals that may have contributed to the Senators’ loss, it was plainly evident on the coach’s reliance towards his top D-pair of Thomas Chabot and Artem Zub to harbour the load.

Chabot’s 29:59 time-on-ice led all players, followed by Zub’s 27:43. In fact Chabot now sits second league-wide averaging 27:25 in ice-time.

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The remaining ice-time among Senators’ blueliners distributed:

Nikita Zaitsev 18:41

Nick Holden 18:38

Victor Mete 10:57

Josh Brown 10:27

Smith on his Chabot/Zub duo, “Well they were so much better than any other pair. It wasn’t close. You don’t want to play them as much as you play them, but ultimately you have three days off between games. Every time those two were out there we had the puck in the offensive zone. And I thought the other players certainly struggled.”

The Senators bench boss is a keen fan of analytics, but the eye test, especially in this particular game was all one needed to see which d-men were going and who were not.

Unfortunately for Josh Brown, it wasn’t a banner evening. He lost the handle on the puck leading to Oshie’s first goal. Brown was also credited with a game-high four giveaways.

Brown, Holden, Zaitsev each posted a minus-3, Mete minus-2. Chabot (plus-3) and Zub (plus-2) were both plus players in the loss.

More importantly, even-strength Corsi numbers tell the story of the Senators D-core. For those who are not familiar with analytics, Corsi is a calculation of a percentage of total on-ice shot attempts for and against, being a shot on goal, missed net, or blocked shot.

Corsi numbers from Monday’s game courtesy of NaturaL Stat Trick:

Note; CF is Corsi For, CA, Corsi Against.

Thomas Chabot 67.8% 40 CF 19 CA

Artem Zub 65.38% 34 CF 18 CA

Nikita Zaitsev 32.35% 11 CF 23 CA

Nick Holden 28.13% 9 CF 23 CA

Victor Mete 22.22% 4 CF 14 CA

Josh Brown 0.00% 0 CF 15 CA

Perusing these numbers, Chabot/Zub are hands down ahead of the remaining four defensemen. Smith really only has one card to play Friday in Dallas. That is bringing in Michael Del Zotto. The Toronto area resident has played in two of the club’s six games to date. 

Barring injury, once of Brown or Mete will likely come out of the lineup.

Smith has little choice other than to work through the lineup he’s been dealt.

Like their counterpart, the Senators’ American League affiliate Belleville is currently going through some injury problems of their own.

Erik Brannstrom is available. However, he’ll be forced to don a full visor after suffering two facial fractures Friday from a Gavin Bayreuther crosscheck. The Cleveland Monsters d-man was suspended two games for this incident. The Senators may not want to put him in harm’s way until his fractures heal. While Lassi Thomson is out day-to-day.

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