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TWENTY-FIFTH ANNIVERSARY: The Senators played the first game in the modern franchise history 25 years ago Sunday against the Montreal Canadiens at the Ottawa Civic Centre.

Returning to the NHL as an expansion franchise, the Senators scored a 5-3 victory that night. Neil Brady scored the first goal in franchise history, while Sylvain Turgeon had what turned out to be the winner in front of 10,449.

The headline in the Citizen the next morning read: “Maybe Rome was built in a day.”

WORK TO BE DONE: The Senators went 0-for-7 on the power play against the Red Wings, leaving them 0-for-12 with the man advantage through two games.

Oh, they had chances against Detroit goalie Jimmy Howard, but couldn’t put the puck in the net. Even though the Senators did get two points from their first two games of the season, a power-play goal or two could have made a big difference.

The Senators must find a way to overcome the fact that Karlsson isn’t available to quarterback the power play.

“It’s pretty hard to say that it’s not (frustrating),” winger Mike Hoffman said. “We’re getting opportunities and we’re getting chances and we’ve played a little better than the 0-for-12 stats show.

“We’re missing one of our big pieces with (Karlsson) and we’ve got to try to get a few more pucks through, get a few more shots and try to create havoc down low.”

The Senators had some glorious opportunities Saturday, but hit a post or crossbar.

“Right now we’re a little bit snake-bit,” Boucher said. “You can’t ask them, except for the puck going in, to get time in the zone, and it’s not like we wasted much time out of the zone. We were in there the whole time, getting our shots and our rebounds, and the goalie was just outstanding. We got some high-end, quality chances and we should have at least had one more.