Ottawa Senators look to continue dominance over Tampa Bay

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Tuesday, 7 p.m., Amalie Arena

TV: TSN5 RADIO: TSN 1200

Odds: Ottawa +132 Tampa Bay -164

THUNDER AND LIGHTNING

The Senators have gotten the best of the Lightning the past couple of seasons, winning six of the past seven games between the two teams.

Say what?

The Lightning have long been a very good team and the Senators have been, well, they’ve been not that good.

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But the Senators seem to have the Lightning’s number, outscoring Tampa Bay 35-22 going back to March 23, 2023.

In a game earlier this season, Ottawa won 5-4 on home ice.

SPECIAL DELIVERY

The Ottawa Senators have their special teams — power play and penalty kill — revved up.

Against Minnesota Saturday, the Senators were 3-for-8 on the power play, plus scored a shorthanded goal.

Two nights before that, in a 5-4 overtime win over Washington, Ottawa had two goals on the power play and two more while shorthanded.

The shorties pushed the Senators up the NHL list; with eight this season, they’re tied with the New York Rangers for third-best in the league (Florida leads with 11).

Going into Monday’s game, Ottawa’s power play was ranked ninth in the NHL, with a 23.4 per cent efficiency rate (Winnipeg is tops with 33.3 per cent).

The penalty kill was ranked 17th at 78.8 per cent (Carolina leads at 86.3 per cent).

ULLMARK, ULLMARK, MORE ULLMARK

OK, this looks like it. It looks like Linus Ullmark will return Tuesday.

Finally.

“It’s been a long road, but I’ve looked forward to this for a long time,” Ullmark told TSN 1200’s Gord Wilson Monday. 

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Ullmark, who has missed the past 18 games with a back injury, was hot before the setback with an 8-0-1 record in his previous nine appearances (1.43 goals-against average and a .960 save percentage).

ROSTERS

OTTAWA

Forwards

Tkachuk/Stutzle/Giroux

Perron/Greig/Batherson

Reinhardt/Pinto/Amadio

Highmore/Ostapachuk/Gaudette

Defencemen

Sanderson/Zub

Chabot/Hamonic

Kleven/Matinpalo

Goaltenders

Ullmark/Forsberg

TAMPA BAY

Forwards

Guentzel/Point/Kucherov

Hagel/Cirelli/Geekie

Girgensons/Paul/Goncalves

Chaffee/Glendening/Eyssimont

Defencemen

Hedman/Raddysh

McDonagh/Cernak

Lilleberg/Perbix

Goaltenders

Vasilevskiy/Tomkins

INJURIES

Ottawa: F Nick Cousins (knee, out for 6-8 weeks); F Josh Norris (mid-body, week to week); D Jacob Bernard-Docker (high-ankle sprain, six weeks); F Noah Gregor (lower body, out for a lengthy period); D Nick Jensen (unspecified injury, day to day).

Tampa Bay: D JJ Moser (lower body, out for several weeks), G Jonas Johansson (lower body, day to day)

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