Drake Batherson produced two goals and an assist to help the Ottawa Senators hold off the Tampa Bay Lightning for a 5-4 victory on Saturday afternoon at Canadian Tire Centre.
Ottawa established an early lead in the opening period. Batherson opened the scoring with a power-play slap shot at 1:50, assisted by Claude Giroux and Jake Sanderson. Josh Norris extended the cushion to 2-0 at 13:21 of the first, converting a wrist shot on passes from Giroux and Batherson. Tampa Bay responded early in the second period when Nikita Kucherov beat Ottawa with a slap shot at 1:59. Nick Paul then evened the score at 2-2 at 10:39 with his first goal of the season, assisted by Anthony Cirelli and Brandon Hagel.
The teams exchanged leads rapidly late in the second period. Batherson scored unassisted with a wrist shot at 13:20 to restore Ottawa's advantage, but Jake Guentzel answered with his first goal of the season at 18:13 to tie the game at 3-3. Just 43 seconds later, Brady Tkachuk put the Senators back ahead 4-3 on a power-play backhand setup by Sanderson and Tim Stutzle. In the third period, Noah Gregor recorded his first goal of the season shorthanded at 6:17 to push the lead to two. Mitchell Chaffee tipped in his first goal of the year at 8:11 for Tampa Bay, but the Lightning could not tie the score again.
Special teams separated the two clubs throughout the afternoon. Ottawa scored twice on five power-play chances and added a shorthanded goal, while Tampa Bay finished 0 for 3 on the man advantage. Anton Forsberg made 25 saves on 29 shots to earn the victory in net for the Senators. Andrei Vasilevskiy stopped 23 of 28 shots in the loss for the Lightning.
The victory pushed Ottawa to a 3-2-0 regular-season record. Tampa Bay took its first regulation loss of the year, falling to 3-1-0. Sanderson finished the game with three assists for the Senators, while Cirelli registered two assists for the Lightning.
