-The Sens have gone 3-3-2 since I last checked in, giving up a pile of goals and playing erratically. This leaves them in the morass of teams on the outside looking in, with a tantalizing chance to make it. Incomprehensibly, the team recalled Stephane Da Costa back on January 20th–Paul MacLean must have a hard-on for seeing the Frenchman struggle with limited minutes on the fourth line (his two goals against Columbus earned him only 2 more minutes of playing time the following game).
-The team continues to kick the tires for a playoff rental, but Murray’s track record in doing so is largely abysmal so I’d prefer they stayed the course (unless they can remove some dead weight at the same time).
-Binghamton is 6-2 over the last couple of weeks and while both losses were ugly (5-1 to Manchester and 5-2 to Rochester) they’ve played quite well. Jeff Ulmer’s excellent recaps of those games can be found over at SenShot. Interestingly enough, the team choose to recall Danny Hobbs rather than one of Ottawa’s prospects (he did well in his first game, picking up a goal and an assist). Scott Greenham, now back in the ECHL, finally did get an AHL-start with Bingo and won it (against Albany).
-Here’s my look at Binghamton at the forty-game mark.
-In Elmira, Jakub Culek has returned to the lineup and put up good numbers (6-1-6-7); Ludwig Karlsson has gone cold (8-2-4-6) with only one point in his last five; Troy Rutkowski (9-0-1-1) continues to struggle.
–Peter Morrow looks at the Sens pro prospects, but unfortunately it’s a mere summary rather than offering specific insight, scouting reports, or projections for those players.
-Fans may not want to hear about the economics of the team, but money impacts the organisation whether fans like it or not, so its worth tracking. TSN, having given up on national coverage, locked up regional coverage of the Sens a few days ago. Travis (via the link) raises the most interesting question: will the extra money Ottawa receives be pumped into the hockey team or into Melnyk’s other business ventures? The owner isn’t required to do the former, so it will be interesting to watch.
-Here’s a look at how the various players in the Sens system are doing (the ranking in brackets is their position in team scoring for the team or among defenseman, depending on the position of the player):
CHL
Curtis Lazar (WHL) 38-29-25-54 (2nd)
Vincent Dunn (QMJHL) 36-20-17-37 (3rd)
Ben Harpur (OHL) 20-3-13-16 (4th)
Jarrod Maidens (OHL) injured
Chris Driedger (WHL) 20-12-6 2.55 .918
Francois Brassard (QMJHL) 23-9-6 3.00 .908
US Junior
Tim Boyle (USPHL) 29-5-13-18 (2nd)
Swedish Junior
Tobias Lindberg (SuperElit/Allsvenskan) 21-6-5-11/3-0-0-0 (7th)
NCAA
Ryan Dzingel (NCAA) 24-17-19-36 (1st)
Max McCormick (NCAA) 24-10-14-24 (2nd)
Robert Baillargeon (NCAA) 25-6-12-18 (2nd)
Quentin Shore (NCAA) 23-6-13-19 (2nd)
Jeff Costello (NCAA) 27-8-6-14 (7th)
Chris Leblanc (NCAA) 21-5-5-10 (3rd)
Swedish Pro
Mikael Wikstrand (SHL/Allsvenskan) 10-2-3-5 (5th)/27-4-16-20 (1st)
Marcus Hogberg (Allsvenskan) 5-7-0 2.86 .897
Not much has changed among the junior prospects, although Driedger and Brassard‘s numbers have declined and Hogberg‘s have improved. On the college side a number of players have moved up a little in terms of where they sit in team scoring, but no one has had a meteoric change in their numbers.
This article is written by Peter Levi (@eyeonthesens)
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