As encouraging as it was to see Shane Pinto, Artem Zub and David Perron participate in this morning’s skate, two personnel decisions raised some eyebrows.
The first was that Anton Forsberg was the first goaltender off the ice and would be starting tonight against the Islanders. The second involved Travis Hamonic taking reps on the third pairing alongside Tyler Kleven.
In the former’s case, at least there’s a defensible argument. Forsberg has had two shutouts in his past three appearances, providing some stability. With Boston and Toronto on the docket following tonight’s game, it makes sense to play Ullmark, the team’s most talented netminder, against those two divisional opponents. If it is safe to assume Forsberg will draw back in for the Flyers game on November 14th, it would have almost been two weeks between starts if he did not play tonight.
There is also the statistical anomaly that in the two instances Ullmark was called on to start consecutive games this season, the Senators have lost both of those games – October 12th against the Canadiens and November 1st against the Rangers.
In Hamonic’s case, the explanations for his presence in the lineup are less convincing.
“Just, you know, we gotta make a decision,” Travis Green stated as he explained his decision to bench Jacob Bernard-Docker. “I’ve liked both guys’ games.
“Obviously Hammer’s been playing with Sandy, playing against a lot of good players in the league, because anyone knows when you’re in the top four you’re playing against the top players. When you’re in the bottom, you’re using the one protected with your ice time. Yeah, they both played well. We had to make the decision.”
As I detailed in a piece a few days ago, the Senators’ third pairing has unquestionably been sheltered. It has also produced one of the league’s best expected goal rates per 60 minutes of five-on-five ice time. A glance at NaturalStatTrick’s data today reveals that only five pairings that have logged more than 100 minutes together have better rates than the Tyler Kleven/Bernard-Docker pairing.
Interestingly, in the two games that Hamonic played with Kleven before Zub’s injury, the pairing fared quite poorly. In the 29 minutes and 14 seconds that they have played together at five-on-five this season, the Senators have generated 37.78 percent of the shots (CF%), 42.86 percent of the shots on goal (SF%), and 40.83 percent of the expected goals.
When asked what Travis Hamonic brought to the lineup, Green pointed to his…