Sens at Land’s End

Politically-Themed Matchup. As two United States Senators wait to find out which of them will take the reigns in their country’s capital this evening, our Ottawa Senators will take on the Washington Capitals in a battle for capital supremacy. Is it possible that the NHL scheduled this matchup of capital city teams for today on purpose? I’m not sure the schedulers have that much foresight.

In case you’d forgotten, the Caps pretty much manhandled the Sens every time they played last season. Let us review:

• November 8, 2007: the struggling Caps, who had lost 10 of their previous 12 games, hand the still surging Sens only their second loss of the season, beating them 4-1. Hockey fans everywhere wonder if perhaps the Sens forgot there was a game.
• December 29, 2007: in what can only be described as an intense goaltenders’ duel, the Caps take out the Sens 8-6. Alexander Ovechkin scores four goals.
• January 1, 2008: the Sens come out to a 2-0 lead before giving up five — yes, five — consecutive Washington goals. But hey, at least they kept Ovechkin from scoring. Woo frickin’ hoo.
• January 15, 2008: the Caps finish the slaughter with a 4-2 win and Sens fans rejoice at the thought of never having to see this team again. Until tonight!

Excellent.

Bye Bye, Little Russian Guy. The Sens got rid of a headache yesterday, dealing Russian prospect Alexander Nikulin to Phoenix for defenseman Drew Fata. Nikulin had threatened to return to Russia if he was not traded, which makes it somewhat amazing that the Coyotes were willing to take him at all.

Welcome Back, Alex. After missing the team’s last two games due to a trip home to Russia to visit his sick grandfather, Ovechkin will make his return to the Caps’ lineup tonight. Lucky, lucky Sens! Ovechkin hadn’t exactly been on fire before leaving: he had five points in eight games, and is tied for 157th in the league in scoring. Which just means he has work to do.

Welcome Back, Alex II. Alex Auld will once again start for the Sens tonight. Auld is among the league leaders in both goals against average (2.15 – fifth) and save percentage (.931 – fourth).

Statistical Roundup. We all know the Sens’ record is not exactly stellar at this point. They are below .500 and in the bottom ten in the league standings. They are also last in the Northeast division. But I was perusing the stat pages at NHL.com the other day and I noticed a few promising numbers:

• Ottawa’s power play is ranked fourth in the NHL (25.0%). The penalty kill (86.3%) is eighth.
• The Sens are 11th in the league in goals against average, having allowed an average of 2.73 goals per game; however, they’re down at 19th overall in goals scored per game (2.82).

So, the special teams are great and they’re at least scoring more goals than they’re giving up. As anyone who’s been watching the games could probably have pointed out, their main problem has been scoring at even strength. In five-on-five play, they’ve scored only 15 goals and given up 21. It’s an interesting issue, but it seems to me their even strength play has improved a bit recently. Let’s hope so.