One thing to watch: It’s been an awakening for The Great 8, 39-year-old Capitals winger Alex Ovechkin, who has 22 goals in 34 games (he scored 31 all of last season). With 875 career goals, he’s now just 19 behind the NHL all-time record set by Wayne Gretzky.

Travis Green wore his best poker face after the club’s skate on Wednesday at the Canadian Tire Centre. Cagey would be the best word to describe the back-and-forth reporters had with Green after goaltender Linus Ullmark participated fully in the 40-minute skate in preparation for Thursday’s visit by Alexander Ovechkin and the Washington Capitals.

In today’s Ottawa Senators News & Rumours report, I’ll take a look at two of the Senators top goalies. One is current, and the other is from the past.

Ullmark has been out of Ottawa's lineup since Dec. 22 when he left a game after one period of play in Edmonton with back tightness. It sounded precautionary at the time but turned out to be reasonably serious. This is Ullmark's second stint on the injury list. He missed a couple of weeks of action back in mid-October.

Poised to return soon

Ottawa Senators forward Nick Cousins will be out through, at least, early March after suffering a knee injury in the team’s Saturday win over the Toronto Maple Leafs.

The Ottawa Senators and Chicago Blackhawks could be the next teams to receive a phone call from Sweden regarding the 4 Nations Face-Off. Sweden has taken a hit

Ottawa Senators goaltender Linus Ullmark has been sidelined for over a month with a back injury. He left a game against the Edmonton Oilers on Dec. 22 and has been out of action ever since.

After missing almost a month of action with a back injury, goalie Linus Ullmark looks like he'll be ready to return to the lineup soon. At that point, with Anton Forsberg and Leevi Merilainen, the Senators will have three available goalies. This just in: there isn't room on the bench for two backup goalies.

Head coach Travis Green says that Jensen won't play because of an undisclosed injury, while Travis Hamonic will make his return.

The Ottawa Senators will be without center Nick Cousins for the next six-to-eight weeks due to a knee injury, reports Postmedia’s Bruce Garrioch. Garrioch adds that Cousins will also seek a second medical opinion on the injury and its anticipated recovery timeline.

Boston Bruins goalie Jeremy Swayman highlighted his close friendship with Linus Ullmark with a special reaction to a social media post.