There's no denying the effort the Senators put in their game against the Devils. But when Martin Brodeur is between the pipes and he's hot - which he usually is - it's dang hard to beat him. And try the Senators did in the third, with point shots, wraparounds, dekes, redirects, breakaways... Nothing going, Brodeur was solid to the end.



Jarkko Ruutu in particular tried his best to put one past Marty, racking up the most shots on goal for the Sens. Nick Foligno was another. Overall, the Senators played well and played with the same type of heart that they've displayed recently. The shutdown type of play the New Jersey squad plays is not conducive to high scoring games, especially when their defense is on as it was last night. Good as this Sens crew has become, they will lose some. This is one of those games where they have to take wahtever lessons they can from the game and move on.

Lessons

The Sens can't get down on themselves for this game. Brian Elliott was solid and were it not for the weird bounce the puck took on a stanchion on a New Jersey dump-in, the first goal may never have happened. The second goal was redirected at the last second, and there wasn't much Elliott could do - after all, Marty at the other end of the ice got beaten on a redirect as well. Elliott displayed impeccable rebound control and was where he needed to be, when he needed to be. No worries for the Sens while Pascal Leclaire is on the mend.

The trio of Chris Neil - Jarkko Ruutu - Chris Kelly was amazing and took it hard to the Devils. Neil showed a lot of determination until he got hit with a knee-on-knee in the first and didn't return. Kelly was strong, with a particularly good play when he stole the puck from a blueliner and had a good scoring chance as a result.

There were three weak spots, two we can do something about, the other we can't. The first was passing. I saw too many passes that were just out of reach of their intended target. Settling the puck to make the next pass or take the shot takes time, and robbed the Senators of some golden opportunities. The second is Elliott indecisiveness in going to the bench for the 6th man. That delay meant that for a good time span, there were only five Sens on the ice and no goalie. By the time Spezza came off the bench, the damage was already done and Langenbrunner was already on his way up the ice for the empty-netter.

The last weak spot was the officiating. My blood is not close enough to boiling yet for me to fire a broadside at the NHL... yet. But the officiating last night sucked with two definite high-sticks not called, a questionably high hit on Alexandre Picard, and Neil's knee-on-knee. The one on Jarkko Ruutu actually drew blood and should have been a four-minute penalty, that could have totally changed the game. Kerry Fraser is definitely off my Christmas card list, and needs to bring his seeing-eye dog on the ice with him.