The first few games of Sam Ersson’s career as an Ottawa Senator didn’t go as smoothly as he would have liked — but the last few have been stellar, with the Swede compiling a 2-0-1 record and a .942 save percentage over his last three appearances.
“I’m feeling, obviously, better. Better and better. Just keep building, keep working on my game, and just keep building on the last couple performances,” said Ersson following the Senators’ Friday morning practice, their first since returning from a five-game road trip.
Ersson led the Senators to wins over Buffalo and San Jose on the road trip in his two starts. He also came into the game in Los Angeles in relief and stopped 20 of 22 shots while the Senators battled back from a 5-1 deficit to force overtime.
While the Senators weren’t able to earn a full two points in that game — they fell to the Kings in overtime — the comeback was a demonstration of what kind of belief the Senators have in each other.
“It's a big point for sure. You want two, especially when you find a way to kind of, come back in a game like that. To find a way to win that, it would have been huge, but like, it's a big point, and [we’ve] got to take that with us,” said Ersson.
“So I think [we] showed a lot of character, which I think really characterizes this group. Like, there's a lot of character, fight, never giving in. So it was good.”
Ersson said he tried not to look at the score and just focused on “grinding away” for the Sens after he came in with the score 4-1 for the Kings.
“It's crazy, for sure. I think that you’ve just got to find a way to just keep playing,” said Ersson.
“Maybe it doesn't happen every time, obviously, but sometimes you find a way to claw yourself back. And every point matters at the end of the year, so yeah, it was a huge point for sure.”
The first extended road trip of the season also served as a perfect time for team bonding — and trying out new restaurants, which Ersson always looks forward to whether he’s on the road with his teammates or back in Ottawa with his girlfriend, Olivia.
“We went to a bunch of good spots. Actually, I think it was an Italian spot in LA that was really good, I think it was called La Dolce Vita or something like that. It was really good. And Ully took us to a Chinese spot in Vegas that was really good, so I think it was just good choices all the way,” said Ersson.
“I mean, we were gone for a long time, it really felt like it. But obviously it's fun, you get to spend a lot of time together, so that's a good thing too, for sure.”
Ersson is understandably feeling better about his game, but his teammates also wanted to stress that they didn’t think his 0-3-0 start to the season was on him.
“I think he's pretty much played, besides this road trip, he's played all the back-to-backs. And you know, to be completely honest with you, we don't really blame ‘Erss’ for that at all,” said Jordan Spence, who said the Sens haven’t been playing well in general on the second end of back-to-backs this year.
“Yeah, we felt like we let him down a bit, didn't play as good as we wanted to those back-to-backs,” said Stephen Halliday. “I think that's been maybe a thing that we’re going to try to clean up, but yeah, like, definitely wanted to play better for him. He played fine in those back-to-backs too.”
“He’s been good for us. I mean, he’s working real hard every day to get better, and you can see in his eyes that he wants to win every point. So we have three actually, three really good goalies, so it’s a good thing,” said Fabian Zetterlund.
With the three Swedish goaltenders in the mix plus Zetterlund — and when they are healthy, Andre Burakovsky and William Eklund too — there's no shortage of Swedish being spoken in the Senators' dressing room.
“It's kind of funny, we were talking about it that we have three Swedish goalies, so, you know, they talk a lot and he's not quiet at all,” said Spence.
“Honestly, I’m not surprised if they go to dinners together too on the road, but it’s also good, I think, for the goalies to have conversations in Swedish and just talk about other things too. It’s been great.
“He's a very open-minded guy, and he brings great vibes into the locker room and off the ice. So we're really happy to have him here. It’s just the start, a long season ahead, but he’s great.”
After practice, Travis Green told the media that he wasn’t sure of Ullmark’s status for Saturday’s game against Utah. But no matter who is in goal, the Sens are feeling good about their chances.
“We have a lot of confidence in him, and he's stepping up. Ully is injured right now, and he wants to take the responsibility and to win games, and I think he's been doing that the past couple games,” said Spence.
“Yeah, he’s been unbelievable,” said Halliday. “Two nights ago, he was unbelievable in Buffalo, made some really big saves, especially when we were down one in the third on the [penalty kill]. Like, he had some unlucky goals at the start of the year, just fluky ones, but I think he’s been unbelievable the last couple of games.”
