Another poor start proves costly for the Senators Thursday night in a 5-2 loss to the Vancouver Canucks.
The Ottawa Senators lost their fifth home game in a row Thursday night, falling 5-2 to the Vancouver Canucks at Canadian Tire Centre. With the loss, the Sens fell to 5-7 on the year, despite holding the NHL’s best offence to just 16 shots.
The Senators' trend of poor starts continued on a goal from Brock Boeser just 15 seconds into the game. Three minutes later, the Canucks pounced on a horrific no-look backhand turnover by Tim Stutzle that allowed Ilya Mikheyev to make it 2-0.
The Senators clawed back into the game, late in the first period. Drake Batherson got a breakaway after knocking down a clearing attempt by Ian Cole. Batherson toe dragged and went top shelf to cut the lead to 2-1 with less than 2 minutes left in the first period.
After missing seven games with a concussion, Artem Zub tied the game midway through the second period, on a shot from the point that deflected off Elias Pettersson into the top corner, over Casey DeSmith’s glove.
But that was as good as it would get for the Senators.
Later in the period, moments after Brady Tkachuk missed a wide-open net, the Sens got caught on a 3 on 2 and JT Miller went bardown over Anton Forsberg’s blocker, which made it 3-2 Canucks.
Pettersson iced the game for the Canucks, throwing the puck on net which hit Mihkeyev in front, for his fifth of the season. Pettersson scored the fifth goal of the game, scoring immediately off a faceoff on the powerplay with a rocket slapshot.
After the game, Batherson addressed the Senators' poor start to the season.
"Well, it's tough obviously”, Batherson said. “I don't know what the exact answer is. Obviously, we're working hard. It's just a matter of getting bounces and playing a full 60 minutes but for the most part, we've been right there.”
Meanwhile, his teammate Jakob Chychrun was frustrated by another loss.
"Nobody in here likes losing,” Chychrun said. “Things haven’t been going our way. Nobody feels sorry for us. We've got to dig deep here and keep working as a unit and get ourselves out of this hole.”
As the game ended, a lighter version of Saturday night's “Fire DJ” chants resumed throughout the Canadian Tire Centre. The Senators lost to the Canucks the same way they've lost many games this season – fall down early, only to roar back, but in the end, too little too late.
DJ Smith was not happy about the Senators start to the game.
“What I don't like is getting scored on 15 seconds in,” said Smith. “When you have the opportunity to start, you have to be on your toes and the first time you touch the puck, you've got to know what you're doing with it.”
By the numbers: With his two goals on Saturday night, Pettersson leads the league with 24 points, while Boeser is now tied for second in goals with 11. Anton Forsberg continued his dreadful start to the season. He now has a .833 save percentage and a 3.79 goals against average.
The Senators move to (5-7-0) and look to bounce back against the struggling Calgary Flames on Saturday night at 7pm.