After blowing a 4-2 lead and losing to Colorado last month, the Senators blew a 4-2 lead and lost to Colorado on Tuesday night.
In what seemed like a replay of their meeting last month, the Ottawa Senators blew a 4-2 lead and fell 7-4 to the Colorado Avalanche on Tuesday night. Mikko Rantanen scored twice and Sam Girard had three assists for the Avs, who scored the game's final five goals.
The game featured the rare January matchup of two starting goalies making their season debuts. Mads Sogaard made 27 saves for the Senators, while Justus Annunen replied with 36 saves for the Avalanche. If the Senators were hoping for another Hamburglar run, there was no sign of it in this one.
The line of Brady Tkachuk, Ridly Greig and Claude Giroux teamed up for eight points on the night, and Greig had the first two-goal game of his career.
The Senators opened the scoring midway through the first period on the power play. Drake Batherson’s shot from the slot was blocked but he made no mistake on his second try, wristing home the game’s first goal.
While Batherson’s goal was still being announced, Artem Zub left Mikko Rantanen alone at the left post and he redirected a perfect cross-ice pass from Cale Makar to tie the game at 1.
Ridly Greig then went to work in the second period. At 1:21, he crammed home a loose puck that had trickled to the goal line after a shot from Brady Tkachuk.
While Greig’s goal was still being announced, Colorado responded again. With Thomas Chabot drifting badly up ice and out of position, the Avs turned a long stretch pass into a 2 on 1, and Jason Polin scored his first NHL goal.
Five minutes later, Greig struck again. Tkachuk took a stretch pass at the Colorado blue line and hit Greig in stride in the slot area. His quick shot beat Annunen for his second of the night.
At 11:04, Jake Sanderson then made it 4-2 Ottawa, sprinting in from the blue line and beating Annunen from a bad angle.
Colorado had a goal called back on an offside challenge. But not long after, at 16:18, the Avs caught Ottawa’s defence napping again with another long stretch pass. That led to Rantanen with a clear lane to the net and he scored his second of the night.
Four minutes into the third, Colorado tied it at 4, as the Senators got caught in the offensive zone after a scoring chance. The Avs quickly transitioned up ice and Logan O’Connor hit the late man, Miles Wood, who skated in and beat Sogaard on the blocker side.
Four minutes after that, the Senators were one second away from killing a penalty when Sogaard got the knob of his stick stuck in the side of the net. Sam Malinski’s shot from the point put the Avs in front to stay.
Colorado made it 6-4 on a goal from O'Connor, prompting the Senators to pull their goalie with over five minutes to play. Devon Toews made it 7-4, scoring into the empty net.
The Senators are now 4-8 since the coaching change and Jacques Martin was asked if part of the Sens problems lie in the mental part of the game.
"I definitely think part of it is mental," Martin said. "You've got to build some resistance. You've got to build some mechanism that when you face adversity it brings the best out of you, instead of folding, you know?"
Sogaard certainly wasn't pleased with his performance.
"Six goals on my end is too many," Sogaard said. "That's something I'm gonna work on and try and be better for these guys."
Tkachuk was asked about a disastrous third period.
"We just didn't execute and play the way we wanted to play there in the third," Tkachuk said. "We knew they were coming off a back to back too, so probably energy was a little bit lower than it normally would be. We just needed to find a way and we didn't.
"We just need to find a way to put in a consistent 60 minute effort."
The Senators will try and regroup – they do seem to be perpetually regrouping – and host Montreal on Thursday.