Ottawa Senators goaltender Craig Anderson earned the NHL’s first star of the month by posting a 0.99 GAA and .967 save percentage in six January starts.
Anderson continued his early season heroics on Friday by turning aside 34 of 35 shots against Carolina, but Hurricanes backup goaltender Dan Ellis did one better in a 1-0 victory.
“Overall, we played a pretty solid defensive game,” Anderson said, according to Sportsnet’s Ian Mendes. “We just didn’t get it going offensively.”
The question now is if this is an anomaly or the start of a bigger problem for the Ottawa Senators.
Finding the back of the net hasn’t been a problem for Ottawa so far this season, but its leading scorer in 2011-12, Jason Spezza, had back surgery on Friday. At this point, a return around the April 3 trade deadline seems like the best case scenario.
That’s prompted Senators GM Bryan Murray to suggest that his team might make a move. A couple more games like this one might impact his decision.
Hurricanes captain Eric Staal netted the game-winning goal. Jeff Skinner came agonizingly close to extending his goal scoring streak to five games, but fell just short:
Fortunately, for Skinner, the Hurricanes didn’t need that goal Friday.
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