Lightning set for matchup vs. new-look Senators

The Ottawa Senators, tonight's opponent for the Tampa Bay Lightning, is a team in flux.
Since the last time the Lightning faced Ottawa on November 10, the Senators have traded Mark Stone, Matt Duchene and Ryan Dzingel, three of their top four leading scorers.
On Friday, Ottawa fired head coach Guy Boucher, promoting Marc Crawford to interim head coach. The Senators occupy the cellar of the NHL standings, five points behind second-to-last Los Angeles. The Sens have long been out of the playoff picture.

Yet, tonight's game could be a challenge for Tampa Bay despite its own comfortable cushion atop the League standings. Ottawa has zero expectations in its matchup against the Lightning and, really, the remainder of its regular season schedule. If the Senators lose, it's just another defeat in a season filled with them. However, the Sens have a number of young, inexperienced players on the roster fighting for jobs in the NHL and to catch the eye of their new head coach. Those teams can be some of the most dangerous to play against according to the Bolts.

"They're a National Hockey League team," Lightning head coach Jon Cooper said. "Both teams are in two different spots. We're fighting to stay in first and make sure we get some home ice in the playoffs. Ottawa's in a situation much like us a couple years ago where we're on the outside looking in probably not making the playoffs, a bunch of new guys in the lineup that are fighting for jobs. And it arguably could be the scariest teams to play because they really have nothing to lose, they're playing for each other, they're playing for themselves, there are so many things that go into it. I remember in 2017 we didn't make it, and we had a lot of new faces, a lot of guys were injured, we were out of and we had a lot of success (over the final quarter of the season). When you get some of that new blood in there, these guys want to work. They're tough teams to play against."
Lightning captain Steven Stamkos has been on teams where the head coach was let go midseason. The next couple of games with a new coach usually see a struggling team playing inspired hockey.
"There's not a lot of expectation on their side, so they usually come out and play really hard," Stamkos said. "They've got some really good young talent over there. They've got a new coach now. From my experience, anytime you play your first couple games against a new coach, you're trying to go out and prove to him you want to be on this team. They're going to give us a good test. I think it's good for us to get back home after a tough loss the other night and try to re-establish our game."
Ottawa has proven to be a pesky team for the Bolts to face this season, regardless of the makeup of the Senators roster or the disparity in points between the two teams. In the first meeting November 4 in Ottawa, it took a miraculous play from Ryan McDonagh to prevent an empty-net goal and a late equalizing goal on the power play by Brayden Point to send the game to overtime, where the Bolts prevailed 14 seconds into the extra frame courtesy of Yanni Gourde's game-winner.
Six nights later at AMALIE Arena, the Lightning lead 4-2 entering the third period but surrendered four goals to lose 6-4, the four goals tied for the most they've allowed in a period this season.

"They play with great speed," Bolts defenseman Victor Hedman said. "They're a team right now that's kind of in a rebuild process. We expect their best tonight. Obviously, they have some changes to their coaching staff yesterday. I've been in that situation myself. You want to come out the next night and prove yourself. We expect them to play with high energy and be tough to play against. We've just got to make sure we bring our A game tonight and we have a big bounce-back game from the Boston game."
The Lightning concluded February with a sterling 12-1-2 record and just missed going through a month without a regulation loss for the second time this season. A 4-1 loss to Boston in their last contest, however, left a "sour" feeling for the Bolts, one they'll look to erase tonight against the Senators.
"I think (the Boston loss) was a little bit of an awakening for us of where we need to be and where we are not right now," Cooper said. "Those reminders can be good right now, especially at this time of year. And now we have to see what we can do with this. Really happy with the way we've played. We've been consistently a pretty darn good team this year. But, as I said, Boston stung a little bit for us, and so we've got to regroup and move on right here."