‘We better be ready’ for Motown

Sens should be wary of vengeful Red Wings, MacLean says

After a day off on Thursday, the Ottawa Senators are back on the ice Friday in preparation for three games on the road: Saturday in Detroit against the Red Wings, Sunday in Raleigh against the Carolina Hurricanes, and Wednesday in Washington against the Capitals.

The Senators will be playing the Hurricanes and Capitals for the first time this season, but this will be their second trip to Motown following a surprising 6-1 win on Oct. 23.

That, says coach Paul MacLean, means just one thing: Watch out.

“We better be ready, after our last visit there, I know that,” he said.

“But anytime you go in there, it doesn’t matter how they’re playing going in, or how you’re playing going in, it could be a fun night.”

Suspicions that general manager Bryan Murray will not sit tight and watch his team struggle have predictably started the rumour mill churning.

What he could get that would bring about a quick fix isn’t readily apparent, and general managers are not in the habit of helping their colleagues get out of jams.

The only thing that matters in the NHL is winning. So when a team isn’t doing that, said defenceman Marc Methot, you have to expect that changes will be made.

“When you’re not winning, that’s usually the case,” Methot said. “You try shuffling the lines, and if that doesn’t work, there’s always the next step.

“You want to find the personnel to make a competitive team, and whatever they do, that’s their decision.”

While those rumours could have a negative effect on a dressing room, making players wonder about their job security, Methot said it also should be motivation.

“For me, for us as players, you’d like to think that’s a motivating factor to get some wins back and show that we have the right group,” he said.

“But again, it’s on us as players to do that. Management is going to do what they have to do, and we have to react accordingly and get some wins, or else we put them in a tough spot.”

Ottawa fans have been consumed over the last few weeks with another of the team’s perennial goalie controversies as backup Robin Lehner stepped in while Craig Anderson was out with a sore neck, won three straight and was named the NHL’s first star of the week.

Anderson, the No. 1, came back and promptly lost three of four starts, giving up almost four goals a game (the 4-2 win over Boston kept the average down) and raising his goalie vital signs. He now has a save percentage of .900 and a goalsagainst average of 3.31.

Unless MacLean makes a superstitious choice for his Saturday starter — Anderson was in net for the 6-1 win in Detroit on Oct. 23 — it will almost surely be Lehner, who is 3-32, with a 2.37 goals-against average and a .939 save percentage.

It’s not just that Anderson has lost, it’s how he has done it.

At least two of the goals he allowed against the Wild in Wednesday’s 4-3 loss were suspect.

No one is doubting that Anderson is a terrific goalie; he has already demonstrated that. But he’s going through a bad patch, which is too bad, because it is not only costing the Senators, it is costing Anderson his chance to be on the U.S. team for the Sochi Olympics.