Gauthier Hat Trick Powers Ducks' Stunning Six-Goal Comeback Over Ottawa

Ottawa led 3-0 after one period and scored zero goals the rest of the way. Anaheim answered with six unanswered to hand the Senators a 6-3 loss that will sting for a while.

The first period looked like a Senators showcase. Philip Tomasino opened the scoring at 6:00 with a snap shot, then Claude Giroux made it 2-0 just 62 seconds later on another snap shot. Michael Amadio capped the period at 17:37, assisted by Giroux and Jake Sanderson, and Ottawa walked into the first intermission with a 3-0 lead and what appeared to be a stranglehold on the game. Laurent Brossoit had faced 23 shots and allowed three. Jonas Johansson, meanwhile, had barely been tested.

Then the second period started, and Anaheim flipped the script entirely. Cutter Gauthier went unassisted at 1:35 to make it 3-1. Judd Caulfield added one at 3:33, with Leo Carlsson picking up an assist, and suddenly it was 3-2. The Ducks kept pressing, and at 19:18 — with the period nearly gone — Caulfield tipped one home to tie it at three. Ottawa had scored three goals in a period and then watched a two-goal lead evaporate in under 18 minutes of play. The story of the night was already writing itself, and it wasn't the one the Senators had in mind.

The third period belonged entirely to Gauthier and Carlsson. Gauthier scored at 1:50 to give Anaheim their first lead of the game, then added another at 2:26 — two goals in 36 seconds — to make it 5-3. Carlsson collected assists on both, finishing the night with three helpers. Roger McQueen added a sixth at 15:19 to put the game away. Gauthier finished with three goals on the night, Caulfield with two goals and an assist, and Carlsson with three assists — all three posting three-point performances. Johansson made 27 saves on 33 shots in the loss. Giroux's 1G-1A was Ottawa's lone bright spot in a game that looks, in hindsight, like a cautionary tale about a 3-0 lead meaning absolutely nothing if you stop playing. Anaheim had already dropped games to Vancouver and Buffalo in recent days, so this win appears to be a much-needed answer to a team that was starting to look like a punching bag. For Ottawa, it's a brutal way to drop points — leading by three, then watching six straight go in the other net.