Ottawa Senators @ Columbus Blue Jackets: Season 25 1/20/26

Tonight's game would be competitive and chippy from the get-go, 5th Line. Tyler Kleven would score only 3:34, shooting the puck for his first goal past Elvis Merzlikins while our goalie was being screened. Claude Giroux adds assist number twenty-six of his season on the primary, while Michael Amadio adds his eleventh with the secondary assist. A few minutes later, Sean Monahan would even the score at 1-1 after scoring his seventh goal this seeeason at 7:46! Our Captain, Boone Jenner, picks up his seventeenth assist with the primary, while the secondary gives Kent Johnson his tenth assist this season, bringing him into the double-digits! It's amazing to see Kent finding his game as of late, and it's even better to see it continuing game after game. That said, someone was bound to break the tie, and it would be the Senators' Tim Stutzle at 10:15 with goal number twenty-two this season. Thomas Chabot adds the primary assist to his season total, bringing it to thirteen, while Nick Jensen earns the secondary assist, bringing his total to ten for the season. The shots on goal would be in favor of the Senators, 7-5, for this opening period. Honest, for how much we were in our zone, the defense did their job by blocking. Ivan Provorov, for example, blocked a shot in the final seconds of this period that made him fall to the ice for a long moment after. Trust me, 5th Line, if you missed that, be thankful because it was definitely anxiety-inducing. The good news is that Ivan Provorov would return for Period 2, but another Blue Jacket would not. 

Jet Greaves would start Period 2 for the Blue Jackets. Elvis Merzlikins would be listed as 'illness,' and the team was unsure if he'd return at any point for the remainder of the game. I'm not making excuses, but we should all know from personal experience or from those around us that sometimes illness can just hit you. I say this because of how well Elvis has performed in recent games; the comments on social media regarding him not returning for the middle period were rather disgusting and disrespectful, especially when we know he has a strong backup in Jet Greaves. That said, Elvis Merzlikins wouldn't miss much in this period! There were many penalties and power plays, but nothing would come from them. The period would conclude with the Blue Jackets winning the shots on goal battle 10-7, but the Senators would maintain their single-goal lead. '

Unfortunately, the Senators would double their lead at 6:49, making their lead 3-1. The goal would belong to Ridly Greig, his seventh this season. Dylan Cozens gets his twenty-second assist this season with the primary, while the secondary assist becomes the fourteenth this season for Thomas Chabot. For those keeping track, the secondary assist on this goal does bring Senators' Thomas Chabot to a multipoint night, 0-2-2. The Blue Jackets would make a fair push in the final minutes to score, but not long after we pulled Jet Greave for an additional attacker, Senators' Brady Tkachuk would score number eleven of his season on our empty net. Tim Stutzle gets assist number twenty-nine of his season, bringing him to a 1-1-2 multipoint night. R Greig gets his fifteenth assist this season, giving himself a multipoint game, too, 1-1-2. Thankfully, this goal at 16:54 would be the last goal for the Senators. Unfortunately, it would also be the last goal of the game. The Blue Jackets lost their first game since Head Coach Rick Bowness took over. It's unfortunate, but it was bound to happen eventually. The final shots on goal battle was a draw, 7-7 in Period 3. 

Thomas Chabot gets the Third Star of the game after his two assists.

 Senators' Goalie, James Reimer, locks down the Second Star of the Game tonight after stopping 21/22 Blue Jackets shots on his visitors' net. This game gave him a .955 save percentage. 

Tim Stutzle gets to add the First Star of the Game to his 1-1-2 night.  

The Dallas Stars will travel to Columbus for a puck drop at 7:00 p.m. on Thursday.     

Go CBJ! 

A Special Note:

To all my readers who've been here since the beginning of my blog in November 2022, and all those who've come along the way, I want to say a special thank you tonight. I've just crossed 100K reads. I'm humbled and honored that you read my game recaps and other posts about our Columbus Blue Jackets, 5th Line. I make no money from this blog by doing it for fun, but it's worth it when I have fans like you all reading it. Thank you all again, and I'll talk to you on Thursday!