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Tampa Bay Lightning vs. Ottawa Senators preview: No longer the Guy Boucher revenge game

The Lightning return home to face a Sens team in disarray.

Tampa Bay Lightning vs. Ottawa Senators: Game 66

Time: 7:00 pm Eastern Time

Location: Amalie Arena

Broadcast/Streaming: CITY, TVAS2

Opponent SBNation Site: Silver Seven Sens

Preview

Despite being the worst team in the league, the Senators have taken 3 points from two last games with the Lightning. But other than that, things are very bad in Ottawa. They are currently on a six-games losing streak and fired their head coach Guy Boucher yesterday. For Boucher, this is the end of his second stint in the NHL, his first coming with the Lightning from 2010 to 2013.

Just two years after losing in the seven game of the Eastern Conference Final, the Senators have reached their lowest point. Although as long as they’re owned by Eugene Melnyk, it’s almost certain they’ll continue to reach lower and lower.

Before the trade deadline, they traded away almost all of their key players: Matt Duchene and Ryan Dzingel have been sent to the Columbus Blue Jackets, Mark Stone to the Vegas Golden Knights. On the other hand, they have 15 draft picks in first three rounds of the next three seasons, which is definitely a good thing, but don’t even have the first round pick this year, because it was traded to Colorado Avalanche in three-team deal between the Senators, the Avalanche and the Predators.

Probably the brightest spots for the Sens are their young players: Thomas Chabot leads the Sens in points among defencemen with 47 points in 56 games, Brady Tkachuk is fourth in scoring rookie in the league with 14 goals.

The Senators have a decent power play percentage and make quite a lot of high scoring chances, but allow even more of them. They have the most goals against in the whole league and one of the lowest save percentages at 5v5.

The Lightning lost their first game since early February and first game in regulation since the end of January in Boston on Thursday. But even with the loss, they are still 17 points ahead of the Bruins.

Louis Domingue’s winning streak has also ended, but he already has his name in the franchise history. Andrei Vasilevskiy will look to continue his. He currently has an eight-game winning streak, which puts him three away from tying the record Domingue just set.

No major changes are expected tonight. Andrei Vasilevskiy will be back in the net. Anton Stralman will be scratched due to the defensive rotation and Dan Girardi will return to the lineup.