The Ottawa Senators have already climbed their place in this year’s playoffs in the Stanley Cup. But big games are still on the regular season schedule, including Friday’s home competition against a Montreal Canadiens squad that also has a lot on the line.
Ottawa (42-30-6, 90 points) currently holds the top wild card stain at the Eastern Conference, with Canadiens (39-30-9, 87 points) in second place. While Montreal has not yet climbed – Canadians can Friday during several scenarios – the team can still catch the senators and turn their seeds before the regular season ends next week.
At the moment, the Canadian coach Martin St. Louis in the bigger picture when his team prepares for his last four regular seasonal games.
“I think it’s important to play well along the route, squeeze a playoffs,” St. said Louis to reporters Thursday. “If we can jump Ottawa, good, but I think our focus is to continue.”
Thanks to a six-match winning line, currently the best in the NHL, Montreal is able to secure his first playoffs since 2021. That’s when Habs made a surprising run to the Stanley Cup final. The team has finished last in the Atlantic Division I each of the last three seasons.
Canadiens are led by a young core. Nick Suzuki, 25, has warmed up in the route and received 17 points in his last 12 matches. He has had several points games in five of his last six, which scored six goals and adds six assists.
The center also leads Montreal with 86 points and is bound with Defenseman Lane Hutson, 21, for most assists with 58. Forward Cole Caufield, 24, tops the team with 37 goals.
In goal, Sam Montembeault has won its last five starts and has not allowed more than two goals in any of these matches.
Ottawa got its first playoffs since 2017 on Tuesday when Montreal beat Detroit Red Wings 4-1. It happened moments after the senators saw a winning line with three games with a 5-2 road defeat against Columbus Blue Jackets.
Coach Travis Green joked that he gave the players 30 seconds to celebrate the performance. While praising his team’s performance this season, he added to do the season would be routine in the coming seasons.
“I think the main focus is that we make our game ready for the playoffs,” he added. “Points are still important … We want to finish as high as we can.”
The senators can also get a boost with the return of the Nick Cousins when the team hits the regular season with a four-game home. The center has been sideways since the end of January with a knee injury but returned to training with the team on Thursday.
Cousins signed with the senators as a free agent last summer after helping Florida Panthers win their first Stanley Cup last season.
Defender Thomas Chabot has a three-game point streak for Ottawa. He had a goal and an assist in Tuesday’s loss on Columbus and had two assists in the team’s 4-0 home victory on Sunday over Blue Jackets.
Goalkeeper Linus Ullmark has won five of his last six starts and comes from his fourth shutdown of the season with Sunday’s victory against Columbus.
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