Ottawa Senators get shutout from Ullmark in win over Canes

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With Gaud already on their side, the Ottawa Senators don’t need Linus Ullmark to be a saviour.

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Just a saver.

A really good saver — just like he was Friday night in Raleigh, N.C.

Just like he has been the past couple of weeks.

Just like the Senators expected when they traded for the goaltender, then signed him to a four-year, $33-million contract extension two months ago.

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With Ullmark flashing his elite puck-stopping skills, the Senators beat the Carolina Hurricanes 3-0 at the Lenovo Center. The Senators, who return home for a Saturday game against Sidney Crosby and the Pittsburgh Penguins, showed poise with and without the puck against the Hurricanes.

“It was a gritty, gritty win,” Ullmark told TSN 1200’s Gord Wilson. “It’s a hard place to come in and play; one of the things is keep the crowd out of it in the first period – (the Hurricanes) really feed off that.”

Raleigh had been a hellhole for the Senators in recent times; Ottawa went into Friday’s game with a 4-17-4 record on the road against the Hurricanes, going back to 2008. There’s also this: The Hurricanes are the eighth-best team in the NHL standings.

Asked if the shutout took on extra importance because it came against the Hurricanes, Ullmark said. “No. It’s just two points. Nothing else.”

“You can’t say enough about (Ullmark), he was the reason we won the game,” said Shane Pinto, who who himself had a pretty big effect on the outcome, scoring two goals to halt a long scoring slump.

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Ullmark, who had allowed just one goal in each of his previous three games, was really good, making 32 stops. He looks much more like the guy who put up an eye-popping 1.89 goals-against average and save-percentage of .938 in the 2022-23 season with the Boston Bruins, when he won the Vezina Trophy as the NHL’s best goaltender.

As for Gaud, Adam Gaudette, the Senators’ second-leading goal scorer with 13, was held off the scoresheet, but continued to see more ice time, on his team’s second line.

“You’ve got to play gritty when you come into the building and play this team,” Senators coach Travis Green said. “It was a good win for our team, we’ve been playing some good hockey.”

Pinto gave Ottawa a 1-0 lead 4:04 into the second period. It was just Pinto’s second goal of the season.

A left toe save by Ullmark a couple of minutes into the third period kept the Hurricanes off the scoreboard.

Defenceman Nick Jensen jumped into the play and wristed a shot between the legs of Carolina goalie Pyotr Kochetkov with 5:15 left.

Pinto then scored into an empty net.

“It was a really complete game,” Jensen said. “It was 1-0 going into the third, it was a tight game. Getting that second goal was a big sigh of relief for a lot of guys on the team.”

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LONG TIME COMING

Now playing on his team’s third line with Nick Cousins and Michael Amadio on his wings, Pinto had not scored a goal since Oct. 10, in the Senators’ season-opening game. A bit more than two months later, he finally put the puck into the net again … and again.

“It feels good,” Pinto said. “For me, it was definitely a monkey off my back. Hopefully, I can keep it going.”

“He’s been playing his best hockey of the year,” Green said. “It was just a matter of time before he scored a goal, it was nice to see him get two. That line’s been a big part of us playing good hockey lately.

NORRIS PAYS FOR SECOND ACT

The NHL slapped a $2,000 fine on Senators centre Josh Norris Friday, under Rule 64 (diving/embellishment). The rule is “designed to bring attention to and more seriously penalize players (and teams) who repeatedly dive and embellish in an attempt to draw penalties.” It was the second time this season the NHL has lowered the boom on Norris.

Norris was issued a warning following an incident flagged by NHL Hockey Operations during a Nov. 7 game against the New York Islanders, then was given another citation for an incident Dec. 5 against Detroit on a play where Marco Kasper was given a holding penalty.

I’m fine with the fine. What’s a couple thousand bucks to a guy who will pocket $9.5 million this season?

I’m not sure the tiny fines are much of a deterrent; it won’t stop players from acting to try to draw a penalty. At least we don’t have to worry about hockey turning into soccer, which can be a theatre of the absurd when it comes to faking injuries.

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