Alex Kovalev is Struggling

If I was an Ottawa Senators fan I wouldn’t know what to think of Alex Kovalev’s recent comments regarding his ugly goal scoring drought. It’s no top secret that when the Senators went out and signed the 36 year-old forward to a two year 10 million dollar contract this summer it was to score goals and be a top point producer on the team. Kovalev who has 398 career goals has scored only four goals in 26 games this year and has currently gone 15 straight without scoring. “It doesn’t bother me,” Kovalev whose last goal came on October 29 against the Tampa Bay Lightning said. “What bothers me the most is that we can’t put up the points.”  It appears that the honeymoon in Ottawa might be over as fans on call in radio shows and internet message boards have been getting on Kovalev who has scored only 14 points this season. When Ottawa was in the middle of what turned out to be a recent disappointing road trip where they went 1-3-1 their owner Eugene Melnyk wasn’t shy in telling the media that he expected more from his star players. He didn’t come out and specifically say Kovalev but most believed that he was talking about him along with star forward Jason Spezza who has only three goals in 27 games. While Kovalev just shrugged off the comments Spezza seemed to take it more to heart. “It just shows how passionate (Melnyk) is about the team,” Spezza said. “Thirty games in, me and Kovy have seven goals combined. We expect more of ourselves, too.” This four time 30 goal scorer has been criticized for taking only 35 shots this season which is miles behind his career pace. “He’s so skilled, he’s got to get more of a shooter mentality and in the past he’s had that,” Senators coach Cory Clouston said. Currently both Spezza and Kovalev have been playing together on the team’s second line. These two need to find their game if the Senators are to have post season success.