ottawa senators shuffle the deck with top centre tim stutzle struggling to score
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there was a changing of the guard at the canadian tire centre on sunday morning.
coming off a frustrating 2-1 loss to the st. louis blues on saturday night at home, coach travis green shuffled his deck by switching around three of the club’s four forward lines to help spark some offence.
the club did everything but score enough goals on the 41 shots they fired at st. louis goalie joel hofer on saturday, but the senators realize they have to be better, especially around the net.
“i definitely don’t think we’re playing that bad,” said veteran winger nick cousins. “offensively, we haven’t scored a 5-on-5 goal in two games, so we’ve got to do a better job as forwards. that’s us getting to the net.
“i hate using the excuse that a goalie played well. i don’t like that at all. the last two goalies we’ve played have been good, but we have to make it harder on them by getting to the net and creating more traffic.”
new york rangers goaltender igor shesterkin makes a save on senators forward nick cousins as rangers blueliner scott morrow defends during an nhl game in ottawa on dec. 4, 2025. cousins says he takes pride in going to the front of the net.
spencer colby
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the canadian press
cousins moved to the left side of tim stutzle and fabian zetterlund, while brady tkachuk skated with dylan cozens and drake batherson. hayden hodgson was sent back to the club’s american hockey league affiliate in bellville, so david perron moved to the fourth line.
part of this is being done to try to get stutzle going because the club needs his offence to make the playoffs. the club’s top centre has only one goal and five points in the club’s last 10 games.
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“he’s going through a stretch where the puck hasn’t gone the way he’s wanted,” said green. “with a skilled player that wants to do well and wants to win desperately, as tim does, and he understands that he is a big part of our offence, and when we lose, he takes a lot on his shoulders.
“sometimes less is more, and sometimes being direct is a way to get out of a rut. can you shoot a little more? can you get inside a little more? can you be a little physical at certain times? sometimes players want to skill their way out of things, and sometimes that backfires on you. so we’ve got to make sure that we’re continuing to talk to timmy, because he’s a competitive person, and no one’s harder on timmy than himself, so we’ve got to work with him and keep his spirits high.”
cousins understands what he has to do when he plays with a guy like stutzle. it should be noted that stutzle did leave practice briefly with a sore right hand/wrist, but wasn’t gone long before coming back to finish up the skate.
“i’ve played with tim before and i take pride in being at the front of the net,” cousins said. “that’s where you’ve got to go, especially in the playoffs, because it becomes harder to score. i’m just going to try to not overcomplicate the game.
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“sometimes when guys play with timmy they tend to try to make more plays; for me it’s about trying to simplify the game. timmy knows my style of play because we’ve played together for a little while here now. i just have to simplify the game, even for him, so he can keep his speed in the neutral zone. he’s a guy that’s easy to read off. he can put pucks in areas and he knows that i’m going to be at the net.”
the skate on sunday was adventurous, at times. if you turned your head, you could certainly have missed something. not long after stutzle originally left, defenceman nick jensen left the ice, was stretching on the bench and went to the room. he returned briefly before shutting it down for the day.
defenceman jake sanderson, who played more than 30 minutes on saturday, had the day off the ice.
tkachuk’s right eye was puffy and swollen as he prepared for the club’s annual christmas family skating party following the practice on sunday.
it’s a battle scar he’ll have for a while after taking a stick near the eye from blues forward robert thomas.
thomas, a close friend of tkachuk, apologized after the game for the accident in the first period, and there are no hard feelings.
“i was talking to him after,” tkachuk said. “i knew he felt bad about that whole thing. it’s just so fluky. i’m just blessed that it wasn’t worse than it was, and i know there was no intention there.
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“it happens, it looks ok, so there will be some good pictures today at the family christmas skate.”
the senators have a short two-day break in the schedule, which will include a visit to the children’s hospital of eastern ontario on monday. then, the club will try to halt its two-game losing streak on tuesday night against the new jersey devils to close out this three-game homestand.
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