Hurricanes lose to Senators, fail to pad lead in Metro

OTTAWA --The Carolina Hurricanes failed to pad their lead in the Metropolitan Division with a 3-2 loss to the Ottawa Senators at Canadian Tire Centre on Monday.

Carolina, which could have clinched home ice in the Eastern Conference First Round with a victory, remained one point ahead of the second-place New Jersey Devils. The Hurricanes are two points ahead of the third-place New York Rangers, who lost 3-2 in a shootout to the Buffalo Sabres on Monday.
Carolina and New Jersey each have two games remaining; New York has one.
"I had to juggle the lines, I had to change the power play because we had guys out there that were doing nothing, I mean, if we're just being honest," Hurricanes coach Rod Brind'Amour said. "We're going to have to call it the way it is. And some of these guys that we count on, have to start being threats when they're out there."
Martin Necas had two assists, and Frederik Andersen made 29 saves for Carolina (50-21-9), which has been outscored 10-5 in three straight losses.
"At this point, we should be really dialed in, and I feel like we didn't really play the way we want to play," Necas said. "We've still got two games to figure it out."
Claude Giroux had two goals and an assist to reach 1,001 NHL points,
Tim Stutzle
had a goal and an assist, and Mads Sogaard made 27 saves for Ottawa (39-35-7), which has won its past two games.
"Getting [Giroux] to 1,000 in the first [period], but then the fact that Carolina needs the points makes the game so much better," Senators coach D.J. Smith said.

Giroux gave Ottawa a 1-0 lead at 5:51 of the first when he redirected a centering pass from Brady Tkachuk. He has scored in four straight games.
"He's had a heck of a year and he's just a smart player," Smith said. "He knows where to go to find pucks, he knows how to make plays. He could have had six, seven points tonight, to be honest with you, if guys finished the passes that he gave them."
Stutzle made it 2-0 at 17:26 on a cross-slot pass from Giroux. The primary assist was Giroux's 1,000th point (327 goals, 673 assists) in 1,099 NHL games.
"I don't like thinking about it," Giroux said of the milestone. "It kind of keeps you away from playing the right way. But at the start of the year, I did. But it's not something I thought I was going to be able to do. But I'm happy I did."
Ottawa thought it had extended it to 3-0 at 5:26 of the second period when Shane Pinto tapped in a cross-crease pass from Tyler Kleven, but a video review determined Kleven was offside.
Brett Pesce cut it to 2-1 at 15:30 when he scored glove side with a snap shot from the left face-off circle during a 4-on-4 for his first goal in 38 games (Jan. 12).
Brent Burns tied it 2-2 at 2:23 of the third period with a slap shot from the point on a power play.
Giroux gave the Senators a 3-2 lead at 9:37 when he scored on a backhand after receiving a drop pass from Pinto during a 4-on-4.

"We weren't playing with a lot of speed, we weren't playing with a lot of aggression," Carolina defenseman Jaccob Slavin said. "I mean, we're a puck-pressuring team, and when we did have the puck we weren't doing what we normally do. We get it in deep, we forecheck, we grind them down low and we didn't really have any grind time in the offensive
. ... Giroux has 34 goals this season, tying his NHL career high set in 2017-18.