As the calendar flips to 2026 and just five weeks remain until the Olympic break, every matchup gets more meaningful in the NHL — especially so when one is between two Atlantic Division opponents.
The Red Wings travel to Ottawa seven points ahead of the Senators in the standings, but Ottawa holds three games in hand. Monday’s game marks the first of four meetings between the teams, the most they will play any opponent from here on out.
“It’s a massive game, not going to sugarcoat it,” said Brady Tkachuk after morning skate on Monday. “It’s a team that we’ve been competing with for the last bunch of years. It’s an opportunity for us to — I wouldn’t say make a statement, but play our game tonight and see where the chips fall.”
Once again, Tkachuk will find himself with Dylan Cozens and Drake Batherson on the second line, but the other forward combinations moved around during morning skate. Claude Giroux skated on the right wing of Tim Stützle across from Fabian Zetterlund, while Ridly Greig skated with Shane Pinto and Michaal Amadio in Giroux’s regular spot.
While Giroux and Stützle haven’t seen much of each other at 5-on-5 this season — they’ve played 69:57 together at the midway point of the season — they have played more together on the penalty kill (54:57) than any other pair of forwards on the Sens, offering easy chemistry.
“I think it’s great when you kind of have a guy you play with a lot too,” said Stützle, talking about the team’s recent success at home on the penalty kill. “We kind of know where the other guy’s going and can read off each other, and I think that helps a lot.”
Travis Green’s departing words to the Senators as he blew the whistle to signify the end of morning skate was to “bring it” against the Red Wings. “You can look at the standings, going to be saying it a lot down the stretch, it’s one of those games that you look at, you know it’s a big game,” Green told the media afterwards.
“I think obviously, the games where we lost, we didn’t play the way we wanted to play. It shows the character of the group, kind of the way we’ve played the last two games — except for the first period against Washington — I think we’ve played pretty solid,” said Stützle.
“Those were two big wins, the standings are really tight, so we’ve just got to keep pushing. There’s another big game tonight.”
