Batherson extends goal streak to six in Senators win against Flames

OTTAWA -- Drake Batherson scored twice to extend his goal streak to six games, and the Ottawa Senators defeated the Calgary Flames 5-1 at Canadian Tire Centre on Monday.

"I couldn't tell you what's going on," said Batherson, whose streak is tied with Jason Spezza, Dany Heatley, Daniel Alfredsson and Bob Kudelski for the longest in Senators history. "I said to the boys, 'I think the last time I scored six like that was maybe peewee.' I don't know. Everything I'm just shooting is going in. The boys are making some great plays for me."
Tim Stutzle
had two assists, and Matt Murray made 27 saves for Ottawa (8-15-1), which went 2-1-0 in the three-game set and has won six of its past nine games.
"He was dialed in from the get-go, and he was even better in the third," Senators coach D.J. Smith said of Murray. "He dialed in, gave our team a chance to get our feet going, and certainly was the best player on the ice for us."
Milan Lucic scored, and David Rittich made 31 saves for Calgary (10-11-2), which has lost three of its past four (1-2-1) and six of its past eight (2-5-1).
"It's unacceptable. We can't have everyone show up on Saturday (6-3 win against Ottawa) and then expect it to be easy tonight," Lucic told SN960 The Fan. "And I think that's our problem right now. Sometimes we want it to be too easy, but when we play the right way, we play hard, and we earn it and work for it, we get the results. But when we don't, we're going to continue to have games like this.
"... We find a way to shoot ourselves in the foot time and time again. That's on us."

Artem Anisimov scored his first of the season to give the Senators a 1-0 lead at 6:22 of the second period when he took a drop pass from Stutzle and shot off the stick of defenseman Nikita Nesterov.
Batherson scored with a wrist shot from the slot on the rush to make it 2-0 at 8:26.
"It's evident just how talented he is," Murray said of Batherson. "He's a great shooter, he's a smart player, he's obviously in the right spot a lot. One of the ways he scores goals is he just puts himself in the right spot. The puck comes to him and he buries his chances."
Lucic scored on his own rebound on the power play to cut it to 2-1 at 10:20 of the second period, but Batherson intercepted a pass from Rittich and scored with a quick shot off defenseman Mark Giordano to make it 3-1 at 11:44.

"We shot ourselves in the foot an awful lot," Flames coach Geoff Ward said. "I thought our first period was good and then we played a little bit of turnover hockey, we lost our third man high. There were a lot of things that happened that they were able to capitalize on.
"There's nobody that's going to feel sorry for us. We've got to come up with the solutions ourselves. As a team, we've got to be more committed to playing the game the right way."
Colin White scored into an empty net to extend the lead to 4-1 at 16:19 of the third period before Evgenii Dadonov redirected Thomas Chabot's shot from the point at 17:47 for the 5-1 final.
"D.J. always says that when you look at the best teams, they're the most consistent every night and they know how to play with a lead and also when they're down a goal," Batherson said. "We're trying to learn off of teams like that and we've been getting better. Tonight we did a great job. We didn't sit back in the third."
NOTES: Batherson has 10 points (seven goals, three assists) during his six-game goal streak. … Stutzle has five assists during a four-game point streak.