Blown defensive coverage costs Senators dearly in loss to Sharks

No excuses. The Ottawa Senators should’ve won that game.

After an emotional battle with the Florida Panthers the previous night, the Senators brought good energy into the second half of a back-to-back against the San Jose Sharks but ultimately lost 6-2 at Canadian Tire Centre on Thursday.

They outshot the Sharks 43-28 and generated a ton of scoring chances. Yaroslav Askarov was unbelievably good in net for San Jose. Two defensive lapses in the middle of the second – both with the top power play unit on the ice — buried Ottawa.

Tim Stützle and Jordan Spence each scored, and Samuel Ersson made 22 saves for the Senators (7-4-0).

No time to waste. Let’s get to grading.

This guy might score 50. Twenty-four hours after an extremely hard fought win, Stützle’s stamina allowed him to still significantly impact the game with his skating. He hustled back to beat Ivar Stenberg to a puck in the ‘D’ zone in the first, taking a hit to get it to safety and quickly turning up ice to hop in the rush. Mere seconds after Stützle finished a 1:10 shift, coach Travis Green tapped his top forward as the extra attacker with a delayed penalty against San Jose. Gliding in, Stützle grabbed a Drake Batherson pass surely intended for Jordan Spence and beat Askarov five-hole for his seventh goal of the season. He had a whale of a game, finishing with five shots and five hits in 22:54 of ice time.

Giroux was one of many Senators plagued by near misses. He hit the cross-bar trying to finish on some great passing with Stützle and Fabian Zetterlund on the rush in the first. Askarov made a nice shoulder save on Giroux’s one-timer from the middle of the slot in the second, and the 38-year-old dented the right post on a rush later in the frame. He went 7-for-10 in draws.

It would’ve been a second straight A-plus if only Zetterlund could finish. Always guaranteed to raise his compete level against his former team, Zetterlund had a game-high nine shots, with five of them coming in and around the blue paint. He failed to beat Askarov on four separate jam plays and couldn’t bury a glorious cross-crease pass from Stephen Halliday in the first. Zetterlund has never been hungrier in a Senators uniform. His decision making has drastically improved in the span of a week, now executing all the little one-touch passes, pokes and chips needed in order to keep the puck moving through traffic in the neutral zone. Zetterlund drew two penalties in the second and hit Spence in stride with a sweet cross-ice feed upon entry ahead of the 4-2 goal. He’s undoubtedly trending in the right direction.

Like Zetterlund, Foegele seems to have found his game after a couple underwhelming weeks to open the campaign. Remaining in the top six for another night, he kept up with Dylan Cozens and Drake Batherson’s speed and playmaking. Foegele wasn’t just relentless on the forecheck — he was cunning. On one shift in the first, he perfectly angled a Sharks defenceman, stripped him of the puck and got it to a linemate to start the cycle. Two won puck battles later and Foegele found Cozens at the side of the net for a chance. Foegele’s wrister from the middle of the slot in the second was dealt with easily by Askarov, who never dropped to his knees unless he had to make a pad save. You don’t see that much from NHL goaltenders these days.

The goal drought is now 11 games, but they’re coming. Hopefully. Cozens continues to breeze by defenders, keeping his feet moving and leaning in to take pucks to the net. He had a team-high seven individual scoring chances and all of them came from below the hashmarks. He fought through whacks and hooks from Michael Misa while driving to the middle to draw a delayed call, which led to Stützle’s 1-0 marker.

Askarov made the save of the year on Batherson late in the second, stretching back to snatch a puck that seemed destined to tickle twine. If that goes in to make it a two-goal deficit with another period to play, do the Sens have a legitimate chance at a comeback?

Amadio stole a couple pucks, but he turned over more. He couldn’t handle a soft pass from Ridly Greig in the offensive zone in the first and lost it to Darnell Nurse, who Amadio promptly tripped on the backcheck. He tried a deke on a breakaway in the opening frame but Askarov stayed with him the whole way.

Pinto’s move on his breakaway in the second was much better than Amadio’s, but he was still robbed by Askarov’s right toe. The shutdown line held Macklin Celebrini to a single shot attempt at even strength and won the possession battle with the Sharks’ top trio. Pinto had four shots in 20:17.

Greig fits like a glove on the third line. You can tell there’s some chemistry forming in the offensive zone, as Greig linked up with Amadio for multiple give-and-gos down low to get shots off in tight. He set up Pinto for a breakaway with a slick pass through a Sharks defenceman’s triangle (the space between a player’s skates and blade). Greig’s giveaway in the defensive zone in the first ultimately led to Nolan Allan’s 1-1 goal.

One awful shift on the power play in the second stained what could’ve been another decent game for Halliday. Stickhandling in the slot with multiple Sharks on him, he waited too long to dish the puck to a teammate, and Sam Dickinson smacked it away. Halliday tracked back to help Jake Sanderson defend a 2-on-2, but he got spun around and lost his man as Collin Graf was free to finish a centring pass into a wide open net. It was a lousy effort — there’s simply no two ways about it.

Nearing the end of a shift in the first, Cousins made a nifty pass around Jacob Trouba to find Amadio in the neutral zone for a breakaway. He should’ve drawn a penalty in the second for having his helmet removed, just like Zetterlund the shift before.

Hodgson only played 3:03.

The top pairing combined for six giveaways, two of them coming from Zub on rather simple breakout passes. The 2-1 goal deflected in off of his stick in the slot.

This one featured a lot of ups and downs for the team’s best defenceman. Sanderson got pickpocketed by Celebrini for a scoring chance early in the first, but then disarmed the Sharks captain a few shifts later, sprinting back to save Zub’s butt on a turnover. He laid out to swipe the puck away from Zack Ostapchuk on a rush in the second, but took an ill-advised knee-on-knee tripping penalty a little later. San Jose would score on the ensuing man advantage. On the 4-1 goal, it was either Sanderson or Batherson’s missed assignment that left Trouba alone in front, as three Senators converged on the puck carrier in the corner. Offensively, Sanderson was solid. Nonetheless, he finished a team-worst minus-4 (two of those are empty netters).

Spence used legal cross-checks (oxymoron?) and strong body position to win physical battles deep in Ottawa’s end. Once, he even lined up Ostapchuk behind the net to halt him from collecting a dump-in. Spence missed a partially open cage in the second while skating in to hammer a rebound, but made up for it in the third with a wonderful effort to cut it to 4-2. After helping defend a Sharks rush, he picked up the puck a few feet in front of Ersson, hit Zetterlund with a lead pass, raced up ice to give Ottawa numbers, received a pass back just inside the blue line and ripped it over Askarov’s glove. He was the team’s most consistent Dman, recording four shots and three hits in 17:34.

Kleven had six shot attempts from the left side but nearly all were deflected high or easily steered aside. His possession numbers were wild — shot attempts were 36-7 for Ottawa when he was on the ice at even strength. Kleven was a team-high plus-2.

Matinpalo defended the Sharks’ counter attack well, hustling back to whack a puck away from Will Smith on a partial break in the first. Those first three strides from the big Finn are powerful. He had issues with coverage in front of the net, especially during the second. Matinpalo had a secondary assist on Spence’s goal.

That’s twice in the past three home games that the Senators have had goal calls reversed because of deceiving rebounds off of the away net’s cross-bar. Yakemchuk still gets points for his shimmy at the right point to find a shooting lane on the play. He’s getting smoother with tricky breakout passes under pressure, and he drew a tripping penalty in the third. He’s also a little grittier in defending the cycle, but the issues with his foot speed and agility remain, making it difficult to keep a close gap with puck carriers.

Ersson was far too deep in his net when Allan got the puck at the left faceoff dot and beat the goaltender with a sharp-angle shot. The Sharks defenceman, who scored one goal in 43 games last season, was given ample room on the far side. Every goal beyond that cannot be blamed on the Senators’ No. 2 netminder.