Before tonight’s 7 p.m. puck drop in Boston we’ve got the latest on the Sens’ projected line-up, starting goalie and more.
Crawford with high praise for White
Colin White has turned some heads during his rookie season and interim head coach Marc Crawford recently shared his thoughts on the team’s 22-year-old pivot.
“I think he’s going to be a top-2 centre when it’s all said and done,” said Crawford. “He’s shown an ability to score, he’s shown an ability to make plays and he’s shown an ability to play with other good players and now you’re seeing him add those dimensions of being reliable and someone you can count on.”
White’s offensive numbers have been solid during his first full NHL season and he currently sits 4th in active team scoring with 35 points (13G, 22A) in 62 games this season. Crawford also believes that White’s role has room to expand and he expects the young centre could be used in a similar way to an opposing player tonight.
“We haven’t really touched much on him being a penalty killer but I would suspect that one day he’ll be a guy that we use somewhat like Patrice Bergeron,” Crawford said. “Bergeron plays on the power play, plays on the penalty kill and plays big minutes…200-foot players do that.”
White idolized Bergeron as a kid growing up in Boston and, while the comparison may be lofty, the Sens interim head coach believes that he can learn a lot from playing against a player of that calibre tonight.
“Anybody can learn anything from playing against Bergeron,” said the coach. “He just plays the game the right way.”
“He does the right things, he says the right things, he’s a leader and he lives the right way,” Crawford continued. “In order to be a top player in the National Hockey League there’s a huge sacrifice that comes with that. Having watched all the great players that I’ve been involved with, it never ceases to amaze me that the one similar factor that they have is that they are always the hardest working guys.”
Video: Ottawa Senators New Guard | Colin White
Projected Line-up
A few brief injury updates to pass along and we’ll start with Christian Jaros who will miss his fourth straight game with a hamstring injury.
“His hamstring continues to get better but he won’t accompany us on this trip,” said Crawford following yesterday’s practice in Ottawa. “We aren’t counting him out yet for Philadelphia and we’re hoping that he continues to keep making progress. It would be terrific if he was able to somehow found a way to be in by Monday but it will hopefully be better and ready to play next week for our home games.”
Anthony Duclair, who took a shot off his foot in Thursday’s contest against the Islanders, didn’t skate yesterday but was able to take part in this morning’s skate and looks to be good to go against the Bruins. Crawford also alluded to a potential hand injury to Bobby Ryan following Thursday’s game but he appears to be fine and has skated the past two days for the Senators.
Video: Sens @ Bruins – Coach Pre-game
Here’s a look at the Sens projected line-up tonight in Boston:
Smith – White – Ryan
Tkachuk – Pageau – Duclair
Balcers – Tierney – Paajarvi
Gibbons – Lindberg – Boedker
Chabot – DeMelo
Wolanin – Ceci
Borowiecki – Harpur
In Goal
Crawford also confirmed that Craig Anderson (14-22-4) will start in goal tonight against the Bruins. The coach praised his veteran netminder’s play of late and while the decisions have been hard to come by, Crawford acknowledged that Anderson has done an excellent job holding down the fort when the team is struggling.
“I thought in the game against the Islanders that he did a great job in the second period of holding us in,” said Crawford. “We gave up 26 shots and that game could have easily been 5-2 or 6-2 and we would have been out of it but we were able to mount a comeback. When we did tie it in the third period we still had a couple of boo-boos and I thought he did a great job of preserving the result.”
Where to Watch
Need a spot to catch the game tonight? Round up a crew and head on over to Buster’s Bar on Carling Ave. where you can catch all the action plus score Molson Canadian drafts for just $5.75 all evening long.
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