The Ottawa Senators hope to continue their modest charge up the NHL standings on Monday night when they host the Detroit Red Wings (7:30 pm on Prime). The Sens have won two straight games, and despite being in second last place in the Atlantic, they're the only team besides first-place Tampa Bay with a positive goal differential.

Entering play on Monday, only eight points separates the Atlantic Division's eight teams.

Both teams are 6-3-1 in their last 10 games.

The Senators beat the Winnipeg Jets 4-2 on Saturday, but Detroit is coming off a sluggish 4-1 loss to the Pittsburgh Penguins, managing only 12 shots in the loss. The Wings hope that AHL callup John Leonard might provide a little more offence. Leonard stands second in the AHL with 20 goals, one behind the leader, Arthur Kaliyev from Ottawa's top farm club in Belleville. 

Tim Stutzle will try extend his point streak to 13 games. He has some work to do to catch Dany Heatley, and in fact, he's still a couple of games away from what he did just last year.

Leevi Meriläinen gets the start in goal again as the Sens hit the exact midway point of the season with this one. They'll line up their chess pieces like this:

Zetterlund-Stutzle-Giroux
Tkachuk-Cozens-Batherson
Greig-Pinto-Amadio
Cousins-Halliday-Perron

Sanderson-Zub
Chabot-Jensen
Kleven-Spence

Merilainen
Shepard

Steve Warne
The Hockey News - Ottawa