House Always Wins (So Far): Ottawa Senators Hope To Spoil Vegas Golden Knights' Perfect 4-0 Home Record

The deck has been cleared (again) for Linus Ullmark's return to the lineup on Friday following a four-game absence.

The Matchup: Ottawa Senators (4-2) at Vegas Golden Knights (4-2-1)

Where: T-Mobile Arena, Las Vegas (RDS2, TSN5)

When: October 25, 6 PM EDT. If you’re wondering why Vegas has a game scheduled on a Friday afternoon, it's because it’s a holiday there. Nevada Day celebrates the state’s admission to the Union, observed on the last Friday of October each year.

What’s New? Both teams last played on Tuesday and should be well-rested. Ottawa has won two consecutive games, defeating Tampa Bay (5-4) on Saturday and Utah (4-0) on Tuesday. That was Ottawa's first road win of the season against a Western Conference team, which equals their total from all of last season. They'll look for another today against Vegas, which improved its home record to a perfect 4-0 with Tuesday's 6-1 trampling of LA. 

Travis Green and Bruce Cassidy will emphasize the importance of avoiding penalties which could turn this game into a high-scoring affair. The two teams rank second (OTT) and fourth (VGK) on the power play, while both have pretty average penalty kills.

Reunited and It Feels So Good: Former Senator Mark Stone is off to a strong start, leading the Knights with 12 points in seven games. He is now in the sixth year of an eight-year contract with the team. Only three of Stone's old Sens' teammates are still in Ottawa: Brady Tkachuk, Thomas Chabot, and Drake Batherson.

In contrast, Senator newcomer Michael Amadio has played with nearly all the current Knights, and this will be his first game back in Vegas since signing a three-year deal with Ottawa. Amadio is still pointless, but has played well and continues to be set up for success. Again today, he's expected to play alongside the Sens' top scorers, Tim Stutzle and Brady Tkachuk.

Ottawa Lineup News: The Senators made two moves on Friday morning that strongly hint at the status of two key players for tonight's game. They recalled Cole Reinhardt (on paper) and returned goalie Leevi Merilainen to Belleville of the AHL (also on paper).

Reinhardt is a provisional recall who may be called into action if center Shane Pinto is unable to play. Pinto hasn’t missed any games but has been absent from practices. Senators head coach Travis Green mentioned to TSN 1200 yesterday that Pinto will be a game-time decision.

Merilainen was called up on Tuesday after Ullmark announced at the morning skate that he couldn’t dress for the game in Salt Lake City. With a 3 PM local start today, there is no morning skate, so Merilainen's demotion suggests that Ullmark is likely to dress for tonight’s game. He has been dealing with what the team described as a "strain" and hasn’t played since October 12.

Defenseman Artem Zub will miss his fourth consecutive game due to a concussion sustained when he was hit by Los Angeles Kings forward Tanner Jeannot on October 14.

Sens projected lineup:

Vegas Lineup News: Shea Theodore returns to the Knights' lineup after missing Tuesday's game against Los Angeles. Yesterday, Theodore signed a seven-year extension with a cap hit of just over $7.4 million. Vegas also signed Calen Addison to an AHL deal; Addison was released after trying out for the Senators earlier this month.

Forward William Karlsson has been sidelined since training camp and will not play tonight. The plan is for Karlsson to make his season debut tomorrow against San Jose. Victor Olofsson is out with a lower-body injury. Prescott's Ben Hutton, one of Claude Giroux's summer workout partners, is listed as a healthy scratch.

Knights Projected Lineup

Adin Hill
Ilya Samsonov