The Ottawa Senators got into the spirit of Easter weekend by laying an egg on Saturday.
The Senators blew a chance to take a small step towards getting to the National Hockey League‘s post-season with a lacklustre 4-1 loss to the Minnesota Wild in front of 18,242 at the Canadian Tire Centre.
If the Senators are going to make the NHL’s big dance for the second straight spring, their best players will have to be at their best from now until the end of the regular season. That was hardly the case in this one.
Captain Brady Tkachuk did his best to lead the attack, but there were far too many passengers for a team in a playoff race. Minnesota goaltender Jesper Wallstedt recorded the win with 33 stops, but he was hardly tested.
“They made it hard for us to get to the net,” Senators head coach Travis Green said. “And I thought we had three or four, maybe a few more guys, that didn’t play as well as they can.”
Only Drake Batherson was able to solve Wallstedt, but that goal came with just 3:17 left in the game, when the issue had already been settled.
Did the Senators play with enough urgency?
“That’s easy to say, ‘Play with urgency.’ Our guys are trying,” Green said. “I just don’t think some guys played well enough. When you ask if we played with enough urgency, I think it feels like you are asking if we tried hard enough.
“That’s just easy to say when you lose. Our guys want to win. They want to win bad. Some guys didn’t have the best game (Saturday), and that would have gone a long way for us to win.”
A short-lived scrum occurs between the Senators and the Wild at the end of the third period of Saturday’s game.
Staying in the playoff push
The Senators were sitting in the final wildcard spot in the NHL’s Eastern Conference, but there was a four-way tie with Detroit, Columbus, and Philadelphia also at 88 points. Ottawa has the tiebreaker over those clubs, having the most regulation-time wins.
But the Senators can’t rely on anyone else to do the dirty work with only six games left on the schedule and the Carolina Hurricanes coming to town for a 5 p.m. start on Sunday.
Saturday’s loss didn’t cost the Senators a playoff spot, but it wasn’t inspiring, either.
Top centre Tim Stutzle had one shot
“They’re a good team, but we just didn’t play good enough. That’s what it was,” said Ottawa centre Shane Pinto, who hit the post with a shot in the first period. “We weren’t winning our battles, we weren’t managing pucks too well, and it’s hard to get anything going.
“(Sunday), we’ve got to simplify our game and try to work a little harder.”
An area that has to improve is the power play. The Senators went 0-for-2 with the man advantage against the Wild, and they’re 0-for-10 in the past four games. It’s a big reason why the Senators are 1-3-1 in the past five.
“Again, easy to say, our power play isn’t one that just sits there and hammers the puck at the net and hopes to score,” Green said. “Their execution probably could have been better.
“In general, I thought some of our passing could have been better (Saturday), but the other team has a say in how you pass the puck as well.”
The Senators are 5-1-1 still in the past seven games at home, but everybody knew this would be a tough spot on the bingo card. The Wild are one of the NHL’s best teams and don’t give up a lot.
Ryan Hartman scored his sixth goal in the past four games and second of the afternoon to extend Minnesota’s lead to 3-0 at 15:31 of the second period. Once the Wild pulled out to a 4-0 lead in the third period, with defenceman Jake Middleton scoring, the race for the exits by fans was started.
After taking a 2-0 lead in the first period, the Wild tried to slow the game down to a crawl. That didn’t stop the Senators from creating opportunities, but there were pockets of this game where chances were hard to come by.
Drake Batherson (19) scores the only Senators goal of the game against Jesper Wallstedt of the Wild late in the third period.
Trailing after the first
After all the noise about not making the start last Saturday in Tampa, it was no surprise to see Linus Ullmark start in net for Ottawa. His team trailed 2-0 after the first period, but there wasn’t much he could do on either goal.
A turnover by Jordan Spence allowed the Wild to get a 2-on-0 break. Mats Zuccarello threw the puck across to Hartman, and he deposited it past Ullmark on the glove side at 15:35 of the first period.
Spence was shaking his head after that one. He knew it was on him.
Jonas Brodin opened the scoring for the Wild. He fired a shot that Ullmark made the initial save on, but the rebound bounced off teammate Nikolas Matinpalo’s skate and back into the net at 9:45.
bgarrioch@postmedia.com
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