Sens Age Shows Against Young Hawks

Tonight, the Sens lost 4-3 in overtime in their one and only meeting this season against the Chicago Blackhawks. The game was exciting from end to end, even from the highest row in the arena, with the standing room crowd behind yelling loudly. For all the smooth moves at both ends of the ice, countless chances hit crossbars and posts, or trickled just wide of the net (including another Chris Neil from behind the net wraparound, nearly identical to the one he missed against Atlanta.)

The best work of the game, once again, came from the top line. Heatley scored two very nice goals, and Spezza and Alfie helping to set up good chances and keep the Hawks at bay. McAmmond's lovely outwait-the-goalie shorthanded goal and assist on Heatley's second goal make him the best surprise of the game.

The Hawks, however, outworked the Sens on countless occasions. For long stretches, the Sens looked like they did around this time last year, slow and clumsy. The young Jonathan Toews would score the OT winner with help from Patrick Sharp, who took the puck from Chris Phillips right in front of Emery. Many of the Young Bloods gave plenty in this outing, and the win was certainly fully earned.

The disappointments from the Sens were many. Chris Neil took two very bad and unnecessary penalties, and the second one lead to the game-tying goal at the start of the third. Meszaros once again showed us all why pinching is a bad idea nine times out of ten. By far the worst performance came from Emery. Some would say that he did well, making key saves, but all of those came from very easy to handle shots. At least two of the four goals were successful because of Emery's lack of lateral speed. His quick glove and stick hands have shown us many great saves, and the quick-twitch muscles, typical of boxers (of which he is a huge fan) help to make his upper-body a tough nut to crack. However, boxing rarely focuses at all on any legwork or speed, and it always shows in his side-to-side movement. Hopefully Emery can begin to understand this vital weakness and fix it, before he is completely usurped by the Darth Gerber. Hopefully though, our defensive end work can tighten up, and we will see the Sens bounce back tomorrow against the low-scoring Rangers.

At least there was the satisfaction that we were beat by Khabibulin, who has a Stanley Cup ring, and not ex-Sen Lalime. We can also be proud that we kept Havlat off the scoresheet. He rewarded us by reminding us why we traded him, leaving the game in the second period with a sore groin.