Tampa Bay Lightning play host to the Ottawa Senatorsin the fourth and final meeting
Tampa Bay Lightning will host league strugglers, Ottawa Senators, at the St. Pete Times Forum this Tuesday. This will be the fourth and final time that the teams play against each other.
Out of the three games that have already taken place between the two teams during the course of the season, Lightning won the first game by 2-1 but Senators bounced back and won the last two games, 2-1 and 3-2, respectively.
Lightning was struggling recently but has been able to get things back together and win. It came up with a decent performance in its last game against Montreal Canadiens which saw Lightning winning in the end.
Senators has been struggling throughout the season but has played the most dominating ice hockey of the season during this month.
It has managed to come up with some big upsets recently but in its last game against Thrashers, it lost 5-4 after a shootout, giving Thrashers an important win.
There were speculations that Senators is underperforming so that it lands with the first draft pick in 2011.
With the performances that it has bagged recently, it has shown that all these allegations are wrong.
Senators is not bothered over the fact that it can’t qualify for the playoffs as it has won seven of its last 11 games in regulation time.
Senators would be pleased to learn the fact that its captain, Daniel Alfredsson, is coming back after missing 23 games due to injury problems.
He will miss the game but still has chance of making an appearance or two before the season ends.
"I'd like to do that, but I don't think it's overly important," Alfredsson said when asked how important it is for him to play again this season. "If I don't, I'll be fine with it -- but I'd like to get in a couple of games if I could. A few more days here
and we'll see how it goes."
Senators has played 76 games during the course of the season out of which it has won 29 games in regulation time, 10 games in overtime to score a total of 68 points.
On the other hand, Lightning has played 75 games out of which they have won 40 games in regulation time, 11 games in overtime to score a total of 91 points.
Lightning was facing a decline in its winning form but it was able to step up the pace in its last game against Carolina Hurricanes which saw it winning 4-2 in the end.
"Lately we've been waiting for games to come to us, and it's not going to happen no matter who you play',' coach, Guy Boucher, said."I think the players realized that Carolina all of a sudden was right behind us and it was real, and we haven't felt like
we were fighting for our lives when everybody else is".
The game is in favour of Lightning on paper but given the upsetting performances of Senators, anything can happen.
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