Steve Duchesne's controversial power-play goal 4:57 into the second period lifted the Ottawa Senators to a 3-2 win over the Vancouver Canucks.
With the score tied, 1-1, Ottawa went on the power play when Vancouver's Troy Crowder was penalized for roughing. The Senators broke in on a 3-on-2 and Wade Redden fired a blast from the left point that was stopped by Corey Hirsch. As the rebound kicked out to Duchesne at the edge of the right faceoff circle, Daniel Alfredsson appeared to catch the back of Hirsch's leg pad with his stick, preventing him from positioning himself for the rebound.
Duchesne scored into the open net for his fourth goal and first in eight games. Hirsch complained to referee Don Van Massenhoven, but the play was not reviewed.
"I look at the replay and it's not that (Alfredsson) was in the crease, it's that he clipped the back of my leg," said Hirsch. "It might not have been on purpose, but there definitely was contact."
The win snapped Ottawa's four-game losing streak and was the Senators' first in four games at Vancouver (1-2-1).
"We got some young players who are scoring some goals. The organization all around is much better. It's not going to be one or two years to change everything, it'll take six or seven," said forward Alexandre Daigle.
The Canucks had their three-game home winning streak broken and played without star Pavel Bure, who served a one-game suspension for his hit on Buffalo defenseman Garry Galley in Wednesday's 7-6 overtime win.
Bure was one of five regulars out of the Vancouver lineup. The others -- Trevor Linden and defensemen Bret Hedican, Dana Murzyn -- are injured. Alexander Mogilny, Martin Gelinas and Markus Naslund played despite having the flu.
Ottawa opened the scoring less than six minutes into the game when rookie Andreas Dackell intercepted Mark Wotton's clearing pass and beat Hirsch for his seventh goal of the season and third in four games.
Naslund tied it at 9:36 with his ninth goal when he took a feed from Mike Ridley, skated around the net before reversing direction and putting a backhander between Damian Rhodes' pads.
Rhodes made 24 saves to post his sixth win.
"I think the guys had confidence. We knew they were missing some guys and we thought we could take advantage of that," he said. "Our guys were loose and they came out skating hard and banging and we focused on playing a gritty road-type game."
Ottawa increased its lead to 3-1 just 31 seconds into the third when Daigle took a pass from Randy Cunneyworth, broke in alone and beat Hirsch for his 10th goal.
"It's at the start of the period. Maybe we should have been all ready to play," said Hirsch. "Daigle's not the knid of guy you want to give a breakaway at the start of a period. I think we should have beat them, but without making excuses, we have seven key guys out. Even if you take a team like Colorado and do the same, they are an average team, too."
Jyrki Lumme drew the Canucks within one with a power-play goal with 6:25 to play.
"I do not want to take anything away from them. They came in here and played a good road game, but we could have played a lot better," said Vancouver's Gino Odjick. "I do not care about how many guys we had out. They had a young defense and we did not dump it in and go at them until it was too late."
Hirsch stopped 21 shots and fell to 7-7-1.
Jon's 3 stars:
1. Steve Duschene
2. Damian Rhodes
3. Corey Hirsch
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