Ottawa has the same record as Utah: 10-6-1, 21 points from 17 games, eight regulation wins and a plus-2 goal difference. The Senators got there a different way. They're 7-1-0 in the eight games Linus Ullmark has started and 3-5-1 in the nine he hasn't, and they've allowed 1.5 goals a game in his starts and 4.4 in the rest. His status for Saturday is open. ESPN's injury list, citing TSN 1200 Ottawa, has him not expected back, and the Mammoth's own game-day preview lists him out, but Travis Green said Friday he wasn't sure. So Saturday answers whether the team in front of Ullmark is good enough to beat Utah. We think it's close to even, and that Utah edges it.
Neither team played Friday night, so every number here runs through Thursday, when Utah lost 5-4 in overtime in Montreal (our recap). Ottawa last played Wednesday, a 2-1 win in Buffalo.
- When and where: Saturday, 5:00 PM MT (7:00 PM ET), at Canadian Tire Centre. TV is Mammoth+ and Utah16, and radio is the NHL App, KSL Sports Zone (97.5 FM), the KSL Sports App and Sirius XM online, per the Mammoth's week-ahead story and its game preview. The NHL's game data adds NHL Network in the U.S. and SN1 and TVAS-D in Canada. Full schedule and the NHL.com game center.
- Records: Utah is 10-6-1, second in the Central in the NHL's standings, 6-4-1 on the road and 5-4-1 in its last 10. Ottawa is 10-6-1, fourth in the Atlantic, 5-2-0 at home and 5-4-1 in its last 10.
- Series: First of two. The second is Jan. 5 at the Delta Center.
- Trip: Game five of six on the road for Utah, which plays at Vegas on Wednesday. Ottawa is home for the first time since Oct. 24, after a five-game road trip, and Saturday starts a three-game homestand.
What Ullmark has been worth
Ottawa's skaters play about even at five-on-five whoever is in net. In Ullmark's eight starts, five-on-five shots on goal were 136-134 Ottawa. In the other nine they were 180-187. The goals are where it splits: 15-6 for Ottawa in Ullmark's starts and 19-20 in the rest, by our count of the NHL play-by-play.
Ullmark has stopped 119 of 124 five-on-five shots, a .960 save percentage. Samuel Ersson and Jonas Johansson are both at .893 there (109 of 122 and 67 of 75). Utah's goalies sit right beside them: Karel Vejmelka at .892 (189 of 212) and Sebastian Cossa at .889 (104 of 117). The other four goalies are within four points of each other at five-on-five.
With the goalies even, Utah has more of everything else. Its power play is first in the NHL at 38.3 percent, and Ottawa's is 31st at 12.1 percent (8 for 66), with no power-play goal in its last three games. Utah puts 29.7 shots on goal a game, sixth in the league; Ottawa puts up 25.9, 21st. Ottawa is shorthanded 3.6 times a game, fourth most, and its kill is 23rd at 73.8 percent. The one thing Ottawa can attack is Utah's own kill, 26th at 70.4 percent (38 of 54).
Ersson's week
The case for Ottawa without Ullmark is Ersson's last three appearances. He stopped 20 of 22 in relief at Los Angeles on Oct. 29, when Ottawa came back from 5-1 down and lost in overtime, then 22 of 23 at San Jose and 24 of 25 at Buffalo. That's 66 of 70 (.943), and Ottawa went 2-0-1. Before that he had stopped 81 of 97 (.835).
"I'm feeling, obviously, better. Better and better," Ersson said after Friday's practice, per Andrew Wilimek on the Senators' site. Stephen Halliday said in the same story that Ersson "was unbelievable in Buffalo." It was a good week, but it's 70 shots set against 97 worse ones before it, and his season five-on-five number, .893, already includes it.
Goalies and lineups
Ottawa put Ullmark on injured reserve on Oct. 22 with a lower-body strain, and Green said then he'd miss one to two weeks, per TSN, citing its reporter Claire Hanna. Green's Friday comment that he wasn't sure came in Wilimek's story, whose line rushes from practice listed Ullmark with the goalies. Catherine Bogart's game preview for the Mammoth on Saturday reads it the other way: "With Linus Ullmark out (lower-body injury), Ersson and Jonas Johansson make up the Senators goaltending tandem." The report that he isn't expected back is from ESPN's injury list, citing TSN 1200 Ottawa. The same list has Ridly Greig (lower body) out, and he wasn't in Friday's line rushes.
Daily Faceoff's starting goalies page showed Ullmark and Vejmelka on Saturday morning, both unconfirmed and with no source cited. It had Ersson on Friday evening, so treat it as a placeholder until morning skate at 9:30 a.m. MT. Cossa started the last two games, in Toronto and Montreal. The Mammoth PR game notes and projected lines for the game weren't posted Saturday morning.
Nate Schmidt played 3:59 on Thursday before an upper-body injury kept him out for the rest of the game, per the Mammoth's game story, and he's day-to-day, per ESPN's list. John Marino is on injured reserve. ESPN's list also has Kailer Yamamoto day-to-day since Friday.
Our pick
Utah 4, Ottawa 3, in overtime. At five-on-five, Utah scores 1.9 a game and Ottawa allowed 2.2 in the nine games Ullmark didn't start, so call it 2.0 for Utah. Ottawa scored 2.1 a game there in those nine and Utah allows 2.1, so 2.1 for Ottawa. On the power play, Ottawa is shorthanded 3.6 times a game, and at Utah's 38.3 percent that's 1.4 goals; Ottawa's kill has allowed 0.9 a game, so about 1.2 for Utah. Utah is shorthanded 3.2 times a game, and at Ottawa's 12.1 percent that's 0.4; Utah's kill has allowed 0.9 a game, so about 0.7 for Ottawa.
That adds up to about 3.2 for Utah and 2.8 for Ottawa. Both round to three, so regulation ends 3-3, and Utah's edge of less than half a goal is why we have it winning in overtime. The recap will count the five-on-five and power-play goals each way.
We're wrong if Ersson's week is real. Stopping .943 against Utah's 29.7 shots a game means fewer than two goals against, and Utah is 0-4-0 this season when it scores two or fewer. If Ullmark plays and stops .960 of Utah's 22.8 five-on-five shots a game, Utah's two goals there become about one, and the edge goes to Ottawa.
Tusks up.
Sources: NHL.com standings, team, club and goalie stats, rosters, box scores, play-by-play and game data. Records and goals by Ottawa's starting goalie, five-on-five shot and goal counts, five-on-five save percentages by goalie, Ersson's game-by-game saves and power-play goals by game are our counts from the NHL's data; goalie save totals are shots minus goals. NHL.com game center; Catherine Bogart, Utah Mammoth: the week ahead, Nov. 2-8; Catherine Bogart, Mammoth game preview, Nov. 7; Mammoth game story, Nov. 5; Andrew Wilimek, Senators: Ersson building confidence with strong road trip; TSN: Senators' Ullmark placed on injured reserve; ESPN injury lists for Ottawa and Utah; Daily Faceoff starting goalies; Mammoth PR game notes; our Montreal recap.