-The Sens lost 4-3 to Minnesota (boxscore, Dave Young‘s summary, and some comments on stats from Travis Yost) where a mediocre performance from Craig Anderson didn’t help matters.

–Nichols transcribes Bob McKenzie’s latest chat about the Sens and while there’s nothing particularly new in what Bob has to say (although I encourage you all to check it out), he did offer this gem:

I don’t think they think too much of Eugene (Melnyk), to be honest.

This isn’t intended quite as it seems, but I enjoy it nonetheless.

–Travis talks about Bryan Murray declaring that team problems will be solved internally.  As Travis says, Murray has no real choice–he can’t trade right now given the team’s internal budget.  I agree that the solutions from Binghamton on the blueline don’t really exist.  If I were MacLean I’d keep playing Patrick Wiercioch until he rounds into form (ala Cowen, see below), but in the meantime we’ll apparently get the unending rotation.

–Amelia L offers up five thoughts and I think she makes a good point that Paul MacLean may be playing Jared Cowen so much for development purposes.  Why that doesn’t apply to Mika Zibanejad remains an open question (as Travis wonders as well).  Her critique of TSN’s coverage of the Sens is on point, but they are still miles ahead of the garbage provided by Sportsnet.

–Mark Parisi is convinced that spending money doesn’t equal winning in the NHL…except that he doesn’t actually look at where Stanley Cup winners sit when it comes to spending (or more generically looking at the records of the teams who spend more, ie here).  The issue has been explored before and I think Mark made the mistake of thinking spending equals winning versus spending being a necessary part of winning.

–Greg Wyshynski offers various thoughts and I like this comment about Ottawa:

What the heck happened with Ottawa? The Sens are 8-10-4 in the Atlantic Division, and the defense that ranked second in the NHL last season is 24th overall with a 3.09 GAA. Who knew Sergei Gonchar was the lynchpin?

I don’t think we’ll see a mea culpa from the media who spent so much time criticising Gonchar while he was here.

-Binghamton plays Adirondack tonight (7-6-2).  Here’s Jeff Ulmer‘s preview.

–Ludwig Karlsson and Jakub Culek have both been sent to Elmira (the former after injury, so it may be purely a conditioning stint).  The Jackals place Kalamazoo (4-4-1) tonight.

This article is written by Peter Levi (@eyeonthesens)

November 22, 2013
Categories: Binghamton Senators, Ottawa Senators . . Author: Eye on the Sens . Comments: 1 Comment

-Ottawa lost again last night (5-2 to Philadelphia, here’s the boxscore).  The Sens rallied from an early 2-0 deficit only to give up two quick goals after their own third was called off upon video review (the final goal was into an empty net).  As seems the norm this season, about half of the lineup showed up for the game, which wasn’t quite enough to beat the Flyers.

-The Sens face Minnesota (13-5-4) tonight; the Wild are coming off a 6-2 drubbing at the hands of Montreal.

-I would love to see someone explore what Paul MacLean thinks he’s achieving with the lamentable Greening-Smith-Neil line as well as why he plays Eric Gryba as much as he does.  I’d like to think it’s more sophisticated than the obvious (“big & physical”)–MacLean and his coaching staff are pretty savvy people–is it simply a matter of there’s no better option or does he think he’s achieving something that’s alluding me?

–Darren M tries to put his finger on the team’s struggles:

So where did the Senators go wrong? After all, they gained a bunch of healthy bodies, and the losses of Alfredsson and Silfverberg were offset by Bobby Ryan and Clarke MacArthur, who have been two of Ottawa’s best players so far. The loss of Peter Regin was offset by, well, the fact that it was just Peter Regin. Realistically, the biggest holes left unfilled were those of Sergei Gonchar and Andre Benoit, but Benoit was rarely used and the return of Erik Karlsson, even on one leg, should have made up for the loss. Yet something’s different than last year: this year’s team is terrible.

Darren’s conclusion is that:

The very simple problem facing the Senators is that they are shooting less than other teams and being shot on more than other teams. This is the difference between good clubs and bad ones, hence last year’s club was a good team and this year’s is a bad one.

That’s definitely a key factor, but I’d bring up three more (one of which Darren touches on): regression of the goaltending (not a significant one, but a slight drop from the insane performance from last season), not being taken seriously for part of last season (a rebuilding team), along with a reminder that the Sens did not have to play Western teams–something they (and the rest of the East) have struggled with.

–Varada reminds us that the Sens have given up the first goal in 70% of their games–needless to say, the percentage of NHL teams who win after scoring first is absurdly high.  He also points out that the players the Sens might like to move aren’t particularly tempting to anyone.

-I think the clock on Derek Grant may be nearing midnight; the main asset he brought to the team was his faceoff acumen, but he’s struggled badly three of the last four games and it may be enough for him to be returned to Binghamton in exchange for someone else (perhaps the return of Jean-Gabriel Pageau).

-Trade rumours continue to swirl as we’ve migrated from Nikitia Nikitin, to Anton Stralman, to Martin Havlat (he of the no-move clause and giant salary), and now Michael Del Zotto.  Putting aside the relative merits of all these players, who are the Sens going to give up for them?  The assets to be sent remain unstated (and as Bob McKenzie pointed out on TSN 1200 last night, given Ottawa’s internal budget it would have to be a dollar-for-dollar trade–very much like the 05-06 season when the cap was introduced).  Is anyone a little gun-shy at acquiring depth defenseman from the Rangers (Matt Gilroy anyone?).  Regardless, I don’t think there’s any trade that serves the organisation long-term that’s worth making–it’s better to suffer through the growth of a young blueline.

-Here’s my look at the Sens at the twenty-game mark.

–Peter Morrow writes about the Sens prospects and despite some errors (Andre Petersson is 23, not 24, David Dziurzynski plays the wing, not center, etc), but he does a decent job describing them all.

-I wonder what’s in the water for Nashville and Anaheim’s European goalie scouts?  The Predators Marek Mazanec (a sixth-round pick in 2012 who didn’t make my (or really anyone’s) 2012 draft predictions, Central Scouting had him tenth among European goaltenders the previous year), has been phenomenal in his rookie season, and there’s little need to dwell on Anaheim’s fantastic crop of goaltenders (including some of the best undrafted free agent signings in the NHL).  Goaltending is the hardest position to predict, but clearly these are two organisations who seem to have figured it out.

November 20, 2013
Categories: Binghamton Senators, Ottawa Senators . . Author: Eye on the Sens . Comments: 4 Comments

–The Sens beat Boston 4-2 last night (boxscore and Amelia L‘s summary), as Craig Anderson picked up his first win since his injury.  Ottawa overcame a 2-0 deficit and dressing Matt Kassian to earn the victory.  Bobby Ryan took an elbow to the head from Dennis Seidenberg late in the third and I agree with Travis Yost that unless Ryan misses time a suspension is unlikely.

–Bob McKenzie talked about Ottawa’s trade possibilities:

I don’t think there’s any question that they’re looking for a defencemen. They’re also, I think, looking for a winger that maybe can play with Jason Spezza. But, keep in mind, anything that happens in Ottawa right now comes back with a lot of financial concerns and staying on budget and making sure that you’re not pumping the budget up too high. So, we’ll see where all that goes. I see part of (carrying eight defencemen) too is that sometimes when you’ve got eight, it’s cause you can find six or seven that you like and the extra guy gives you a little flexibility here and there. You know, Borowiecki came up and did a real good job of injecting a little life through the lineup and scored a goal – his first NHL goal. He’s kind of been a little bit of a catalyst there when they did go on a little bit of a run.

It’s difficult to find a blueliner or a scoring winger when you don’t want to add salary, so if the Sens make a move they have to swing for the fences–a player they hope can improve in Ottawa or else a player they think can shake out of a slump that has them on the outs with their current team.

–Cyril Leeder talked about the Sens attendance–is he concerned?

No. No, we’d like to be full obviously every night, but we’re right where we thought we’d be at this point of the year. And as I’ve said in two of the interviews this week that our revenues on tickets are up this year, year-over-year and compared to last year and compared to the last full year (in) ‘11/12. Just to change some of the promotions, and the discounting, and the policies we’ve had have really attributed to that. We’ve always had a realistic goal for us is to really get a 13,000 season ticket holders and sort of make that our base and hopefully grow from there. We got there one year in 2007/08, the year after the Stanley Cup Final run. And we’ve made great progress the last two years now. I think we’re a little over 12,000 season seat owners now and that’s coming off of the last two full years – ‘11/12 and this year—(We’ve had) double-digit growth in season seat owners, so we’re in a pretty good spot there and we’ve got a good product. The team is really solid on the ice and we’ve got a bunch of good, young players and I think that people can see that there is a future with this team. (Fans) like this team a lot and we’re making the progress we need to on the season seat side and we just need to stay at that

So…nothing to worry about as far as Leeder is concerned, at least publically.  There’s a lot more about the future in Nichols’ link above, but I’m not going to get too excited about that (the LTR etc) at this point.

–Binghamton defeated Adirondack 4-2 last night (boxscore and Jeff Ulmer‘s summary), behind Nathan Lawson‘s 48-saves.  They face Rochester (7-3-4) tonight.

–Jakub Culek scored the only goal as Elmira got crushed by Wheeling 5-1 (Scott Greenham took the loss).  Elmira gets the chance for revenge tonight.

–Brian Cazeneuve echoes my sentiment that tragedy is likely going to be what pushes fighting out of the NHL.  I bring up his article not for that, however, but this:

Without fighting, the game’s traditionalists argue, dirty players who swing sticks and hunt for kneecaps wouldn’t be held accountable for their misconduct. Perhaps, but the prospect of brawling never stopped players such as Ken Linseman, Claude Lemieux, Ulf Samuelsson and Sean Avery from playing dirty.

Exactly.  It’s never been a deterrent.

This article is written by Peter Levi (@eyeonthesens)

November 16, 2013
Categories: Binghamton Senators, Ottawa Senators . . Author: Eye on the Sens . Comments: Leave a comment

-I did not see Ottawa’s 5-0 loss to Philadelphia (boxscore), as the Sens laid an egg in Craig Anderson‘s return.  The loss has allowed trade talk to continue to fester (Jeremy Milks wants more toughness added–to make Ottawa the Vityaz Podolsk of the NHL–and hopes to land someone likes Wayne Simmonds without suggesting who would go the other way).  On the other hand, Nichols simply vents his frustration, while Travis Yost looks at the Sens poor possession numbers.  I have to wonder, given Ottawa’s struggles getting out of their own zone, how much extra water Sergei Gonchar pulled while he was here.  I still believe Jared Cowen and Patrick Wiercioch will be fine over time, but at the moment they aren’t ready to fill the 3-4 spots on the roster.

–Amelia L writes a long piece about Paul MacLean and it’s a nice refresher on the coach’s background as well as on his approach with his players.

–Ryan Classic reminds us of the Sens goaltender controversies of years past (and the here and now).

–Nichols writes about an interview with former Sens scout Anders Forsberg and how the scout convinced the Sens to aim for Oliver Ekman-Larsson in the 2009 draft (Phoenix, unexpectedly, took him early however).  The interesting part for me is that Forsberg is now on the hunt for an NHL scouting job and it would be great to see him back with Ottawa.

-The B-Sens sent Jakub Culek back down to Elmira (the Jackals play tonight).

–Pierre LeBrun outlines the discussions at the GM’s meeting, but with nothing decided it’s simply food for thought.  Other than a change to overtime I don’t think much will happen in the near future.

–Mike G. Morreale talks to NHL scouts about how they assess prospects and here’s a quote:

If he can’t skate, he can’t play. You have to decide if a player has a skill set of a pro prospect; can he skate or is his stride good enough that he will improve with strength.

This article is written by Peter Levi (@eyeonthesens)

November 14, 2013
Categories: Binghamton Senators, Ottawa Senators . . Author: Eye on the Sens . Comments: Leave a comment

-Ottawa hung on to defeat Florida 3-2 on Saturday (boxscore and Mark Parisi‘s summary) as Robin Lehner picked up another win (and was named the NHL’s #1 star of the week).  There’s a moderate amount of debate about goaltending because Craig Anderson will start in the Sens next game, but it’s a little silly–Anderson needs his reps and the staff needs to see where his game is at.

–Travis Yost continues to talk trades, but doesn’t speculate on what that might consist of other than being meant to help the blueline.

-On the funny side of things, I apparently started a blog for October 24th and somehow missed finishing it–the corpse remains however and here it is: The Sens steamrolled the Red Wings 6-1 last night, shelling Jimmy Howard.  Mika Zibanejad picked up an assist in his season debut and it will be interesting to see how Paul MacLean tweaks his lineup against Anaheim.  I think as long as Derek Grant continues to win faceoffs he’ll stick in the short-term.  Here’s the boxscore (there were no full summaries of the game, but Travis Yost offers some thoughts).  Mike Babcock said:

Their team came prepared to play and skated us into the ground. We didn’t play at all.

-Binghamton crushed Rochester 7-3 (boxscore and Jeff Ulmer‘s summary) in Nathan Lawson‘s and then they beat Hershey in a shootout 5-4 (boxscore and Jeff‘s summary) with Andrew Hammond racking up 41-saves for the victory.  The B-Sens are 9-4 on the season now and assuming the roster remains relatively intact (and healthy) looks in good shape for a playoff run at season’s end.  Stephane Da Costa was named the AHL player of the week (largely based on his performance against Rochester).

-Here’s the latest Sens prospect update, which doesn’t contain anything particularly weighty other than Chris Driedger‘s sub par numbers.

–Aaron Gordon writes an excellent piece on how sports teams get tax payers to fund their buildings.  The key thing here is persuading public officials to spearhead the effort (public opinion, as Aaron points out, is irrelevant).  Public funding is, of course, a terrible idea for the public.

–Eric Duhatschek wonders what the NHL will do about fighting:

Knowing the slow pace of change on this particular issue – and the fact that even if the league wants to move on it quickly, they will receive stiff resistance from the NHL players association, which has a lot of important voices defending fighting – makes you hold out little hope that much of any consequence will be resolved this time around.

Nothing new really, but he echoes my sentiment.

This article is written by Peter Levi (@eyeonthesens)

November 11, 2013
Categories: Binghamton Senators, Ottawa Senators . . Author: Eye on the Sens . Comments: 2 Comments

-Ottawa faces Florida (3-9-4) this afternoon in yet another poor scheduling decision (I mean, the Panthers for an afternoon game?).  Robin Lehner gets the start and Patrick Wiercioch draws back into the lineup.

-After panic had begun to set in amongst the fanbase the Sens rattled off consecutive 4-1 wins over Columbus (boxscore and Dave Young‘s summary) and Montreal (boxscore; none of the recaps I saw were particularly engaging, although the praise for the goaltending was well deserved), both wins earned by Lehner.  The wins certainly don’t spell an end to the many issues the team has, but are encouraging nonetheless.

-Speaking of fan panic, Elliotte Friedman threw some gasoline onto the fire by noting that:

if you’re four points out of the playoffs after games on that date [Nov.1], you are in a brutal spot to make it.  The Nov. 1 stat being, “from 2005-06 through 2011-12, just three of 32 teams who were four points out of a playoff position on November 1 recovered to make it.“

It’s an interesting state, although without context I’m not sure how useful it is (the Sens are just on the edge of it, but how many teams were exactly at that point previously–if it’s just a few it’s not particularly meaningful).

–Jeremy Milks addresses the attendance problem and echoes what I said two weeks ago in that the negativity created around the team by Eugene Melnyk plays a major role.

-I can’t mention Jeremy and not think of “toughness”, which Derek Zona has some fun with by pointing out the “softest” players in the NHL (as measured by George Roop) are among the best in the league.

–Bryan Murray spoke and Nichols transcribed, but there weren’t any tasty morsels for me in what he said other than praising Zack Smith (something Paul MacLean has already done this season) and that the Sens want to win now (something I think is pretty self-evident via the Bobby Ryan).

–Travis Yost examines trade possibilities to help Ottawa’s blueline without getting into specifics (and adds nothing new really), but I enjoyed this:

It always unnerves me a bit when there’s absolute agreement on a particular subject within a fan base

Apparently I stand alone–I’m fine with the Sens holding off on making a trade.  Eric Gryba and Joe Corvo are nothing more than placeholders in the lineup so I don’t get too excited over their middling play.  Were it not for Murray’s desire to win now I’m not sure anyone would (or should) be worried about the team’s defensive struggles.

-Binghamton beat Rochester 4-3 in a shootout (boxscore and Jeff Ulmer‘s recap), with Andrew Hammond earning the win and Cody Ceci picking up his second overtime winner of the season.  The B-Sens play Rochester (5-2-2-1) again tonight.

-Elmira has gone 1-2 through the week, with Scott Greenham going 1-1 (and looking a bit more human in the process), but none of the Sens prospects played in the games.

This article is written by Peter Levi (@eyeonthesens)

November 9, 2013
Categories: Binghamton Senators, Ottawa Senators . . Author: Eye on the Sens . Comments: 1 Comment

-As some of you have noticed I haven’t been posting daily for the last little while.  Part of the reason for the change is work-related, but the other is simply me getting tired of the generic coverage the team receives.  I’ve been blogging about the Sens for six years and there are days where nothing engaging is happening or being discussed.  Paid bloggers (and journalists) often fill such days with trade speculation and what not, but I don’t find that kind of thing particularly engaging to write about.

-The Sens play Columbus (5-8-0) tonight–in fact, the game is under way.  Robin Lehner gets the start while Patrick Wiercioch sits in favour of Mark Borowiecki so that Paul MacLean can continue to tweak the blogosphere by playing Jared Cowen.

-Ottawa lost 4-3 in a shootout to Dallas (boxscore and Ryan Classic‘s summary) with Craig Anderson leaving on a stretcher late, but he’s apparently just day-to-day.  The other good news is that Ottawa fought back from a two and one goal deficit and grabbed a point.

–Paul MacLean offered some thoughts on Cowen‘s season:

Jared‘s game is coming around, it’s been a little slower maybe than we anticipated it would, but we have to remember he did miss a whole year and he did miss some of training camp. Any time you miss that much it takes time to get back up to speed and get back into the rhythm of the game. I think his last two games have been better than his previous two games to that, but again, it still needs to be better. I think when he concentrates on the physical side of the game and being hard to play against, that simplifies his game and he’s a much better player.

Missing training camp and the injury are good reasons and worth keeping in mind.

–Travis Yost provides some zone-entry data for the Sens–no real surprises for me, but worth a look.

–Nichols re-visits the Sens attendance issues that Amelia discussed a week earlier.  There’s not much new here, although I do like his theory that:

If season tickets are rising but attendance figures are in the decline, what’s really going on?  Perhaps the most likely explanation is that the Senators have simply stopped giving away as many discounted or free tickets as they have in the past. I mean, with Melnyk crying poor and using the Senators financial situation as a rallying cry for fans to get onboard the idea of putting a casino adjacent to the Canadian Tire Centre, wouldn’t it make sense to make the ticket sale issue as transparent as possible?

I’m less convinced by Nichols’ idea that tailgating or a better developed Kanata would help the numbers (oddly, no one I’ve seen has studied the issue–or at least, not in a hockey context).  Those elements seem to have little to no impact on attendance in other Canadian cities, so it seems a farfetched.

–Scott makes the case for the Sens to acquire Nikita Nikitin (for those who missed Varada do the same thing last week).  Scott includes that the Blue Jackets are trying to move the Russian defenseman, but doesn’t offer up much in the way of trade bait to get him (Stephane Da Costa, Mike Hoffman, and/or Colin Greening?!), although I don’t know Columbus’ organisational needs well enough to complete dismiss the idea (god knows, there have been worse trades made in the NHL).

-Here’s my look at the Binghamton Senators ten-games into the season (link).

–Justin Azevedo wonders if size matters in the NHL and after looking at the numbers his conclusions don’t surprise me:

It’s no secret that teams covet players with size. Everyone is trying to find “the next Milan Lucic” or “the next Zdeno Chara“. Unfortunately, the stunningly obvious reality is that not every player with size will make any sort of an impact at the NHL level. So then why do GMs continue to reduce their odds at finding NHLers? It’s simple: the pursuit of the outlier is a much more attractive option to the average person than it is to settle for the medial. To me, that doesn’t really make sense – the point of an NHL draft is to maximize the amount of NHLers you can get your hands on. The farther away you go, the harder it is to find an NHLer. Thus, draft players who are already equipped with point scoring and skating ability before you draft for size.

–Allan Muir tries to defend fighting by insulting the anti-fighting crowd and providing no argumentation for his own position other than:

There has to be an element of honor to fighting. If someone like Emery chooses to abandon it, he should pay a price.

Er, there does?  He should?  Just saying it doesn’t make it so.  The fly in the ointment for the pro-fighting crowd is they have no arguments to support the practice–they can only stand by their personal enjoyment, which is why the debate becomes redundant.  Ultimately fighting will disappear, but as I’ve said many times before it will take a long time.

This article is written by Peter Levi (@eyeonthesens)

November 5, 2013
Categories: Binghamton Senators, Ottawa Senators . . Author: Eye on the Sens . Comments: Leave a comment

The Binghamton Senators have reached the 10-game mark so it’s time to take stock and see how the team and the players are doing.  The B-Sens went 6-4-0, good for 4th in their division and 7th in the conference.  The team’s 31 goals are 7th in the conference and their 31 goals against are tied for 10th (Matt Weinstein offers a few more stats).

Player’s stats (INJ=games missed due to injury, SCR= scratched, SUS=suspended, NHL=games in the NHL, ECHL=games in the ECHL):

Mike Hoffman 10-5-5-10 +1
Cody Ceci 10-1-7-8 +2
Mika Zibanejad 6-2-5-7 +1 [NHL 6-3-1-4 -2]
Chris Wideman 9-1-6-7 -5 INJ 1
Jean-Gabriel Pageau 2-0-5-5 +2 [NHL 8-1-0-1 -3]
Stephane Da Costa 7-1-4-5 Even [NHL 4-0-0-0 +1]
Cole Schneider 9-4-1-5 +3 SCR 1
Matt Puempel 10-3-2-5 -4
Andre Petersson 5-2-2-4 Even INJ 5
Shane Prince 8-2-2-4 -2 SCR 2
Buddy Robinson 9-2-2-4 +2 SCR 1
Derek Grant 3-2-0-2 +2 [NHL 7-0-1-1 -2]
Corey Cowick 10-1-1-2 -3
Troy Rutkowski 4-1-0-1 -5 [ECHL 3-0-0-0 +2]
Ben Blood 6-0-1-1 +1 SCR 4
Tyler Eckford 6-0-1-1 +5 SCR 4
Darren Kramer 8-1-0-1 -4 SCR 2
Jim O’Brien 8-1-0-1 -4 INJ 2
David Dziurzynski 9-0-1-1 +1 INJ 1
Wacey Hamilton 10-1-0-1 -1
Mark Stone 1-0-0-0 Even INJ 9
Jakub Culek 2-0-0-0 -2 [ECHL 3-0-2-2 +3]
Ludwig Karlsson 3-0-0-0 -2 [ECHL 2-1-0-1 -1]
Michael Sdao 6-0-0-0 -1 SCR 4
Mark Borowiecki 9-0-0-0 -2 [NHL 1-0-0-0 -1]
Fredrik Claesson 10-0-0-0 +3

Nathan Lawson 5-1-0 2.22 .931
Andrew Hammond 1-3-0 4.45 .842

Hoffman and Ceci paced the B-Sens offensively, the latter moving relatively seamlessly from the CHL to the AHL.  Despite limited play Eckford leads the plus/minus charge (+5) while Wideman and the now demoted Rutkowski sit on the opposite side at -5.  Both Petersson and Stone have been struck by the injury bug yet again, while Prince and Schneider initially struggled out of the gate before finding their form.  Jim O’Brien did nothing to help his cause (his only point coming via an empty net goal) before suffering an injury.  Lawson has been excellent in net, while Hammond continues to adjust to the pro game.

This article is written by Peter Levi (@eyeonthesens)

November 5, 2013
Categories: Binghamton Senators, Ottawa Senators . . Author: Eye on the Sens . Comments: 1 Comment

-The Sens play Dallas (5-6-2) this afternoon in a game that’s likely to have sparse attendance (NHL schedule makers have not been kind to Ottawa this season).  Craig Anderson will start and MacLean has put combinations into the blender again for this game (Travis Yost does a good job exploring what MacLean might have been trying to accomplish).

-Ottawa lost 5-4 to the Islanders in a game where Robin Lehner was left to fend for himself (he made 53 saves) while the Sens blew two different two goal leads (boxscore).  The loss has led to more and more bloggers questioning of Paul MacLean’s lineup decisions (see above).  I still think it’s a little too early to panic.

-The Sens called up Mark Borowiecki to help shore up their porous blueline and this seems either a comfort move for MacLean (he knows Borowiecki) or a shot across the bow to marginal players like Eric Gryba.  The B-Sens captain has been average thus far in the AHL, so it’s not specifically a performance-based decision for Boro.

-Binghamton dominated Adirondack on Friday, but lost 3-1 (boxscore with Jeff Ulmer‘s recap), with Andrew Hammond taking the loss.  The B-Sens bounced back and beat Syracuse 4-2 (boxscore and Ulmer‘s recap) last night as Nathan Lawson picked up the win and Jean-Gabriel Pageau enjoyed a 4-point night.  Now ten games in, Binghamton is 6-4-0.

-Elmira went 1-1 on the weekend, with Scott Greenham picking up the shutout win on Friday, while he was shelled the following night.  Jakub Culek had an assist in each game.

–John Buccigross writes a naïve article about violence in hockey (the kind that earns suspensions) where he argues the plays can be coached out of the game.  Right.  If we’re all nice to each other there will be no wars or crime either.  The problem with this kind of simplistic reasoning is that as long as someone in the game thinks that going over the edge will help their team win they will continue to do so until the league makes that strategy unviable.  We all function based on incentives and given that in winning is everything Buccigross’ notion is simply untenable.

This article is written by Peter Levi (@eyeonthesens)

November 3, 2013
Categories: Binghamton Senators, Ottawa Senators . . Author: Eye on the Sens . Comments: Leave a comment