There was a time when Chris Wideman wondered if he would ever score another goal in the NHL.
He scored twice Saturday to lead the Ottawa Senators to a 5-1 win over the Los Angeles Kings.
After suffering a season-ending hamstring injury last November, Wideman said he wasn’t sure he would play again.
“The way I look at it now is every game is gravy,” Wideman said. “When I first got hurt, I thought I was done. We put in a lot of hard work with the staff, myself, and I got a lot of support from family and my girlfriend and guys here and buddies around the league, so it’s just great to be back.
“I was happy to get the first one, for sure, and the second was icing on the cake, I guess.”
Chris Tierney, Mark Stone and Colin White also scored for the Senators (2-2-1) and Craig Anderson stopped 36 shots.
Trevor Lewis scored the lone goal for the Kings (2-2-1), who wrap up their four-game road trip Monday in Toronto.
Los Angeles netminder Jack Campbell, who was making his fourth consecutive start, allowed four goals on 11 shots before being replaced by Peter Budaj.
Budaj allowed one goal on 11 shots.
“I thought we got off to a good start the first couple of minutes and drew a couple penalties, but didn’t really generate much on the power play,” said Kings coach John Stevens. “Too many one-on-one battles being lost around their net that could amount to easy goals and then we had a big hole to dig out of there.”
Tierney opened the scoring just over six minutes into the game as he tipped a Dylan DeMelo shot past Campbell.
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Wideman, with his first goal in nearly a year, made it 2-0 later in the first period as he jumped on a Brady Tkachuk rebound. Stone added a power-play goal moments later.
“It was a bad start and they capitalized on some opportunities,” said Kings defenceman Jake Muzzin. “We put some pressure on them later, but it was too late.
“We’ve got to do a better job of being prepared for a game.”
White made it 4-0 in the second period as he sped down the wing and beat Campbell with a wrist shot to end the goaltender’s afternoon. Lewis got the Kings on the board later in the period before Wideman tacked on an insurance goal in the third period during a delayed penalty call.
“Everybody made their mark on the game,” said Senators coach Guy Boucher. “There were blocked shots, intelligent plays at the right moment, good plays without the puck. Our goaltender was solid so it was a real nice team victory.”
With Cody Ceci on injury reserve, Ben Harpur made his regular-season debut and led all Ottawa defencemen in ice time playing 22:37.
Harpur signed a one-way, two-year contract in the off-season, but he struggled in training camp and fell down the depth chart.
“I was really happy to have the chance to step in the lineup today and even happier to help the team get a win,” said the 23-year-old Harpur. “It’s a mental battle personally, but a lot of guys in this room took the time to talk to me at the rink which goes a long way. A lot of the guys have been in that same situation so they have good advice, so it’s nice to have teammates have that support.”
This was the Kings’ lone visit to Ottawa this season and marked the return of Dion Phaneuf, who was traded to Los Angeles last February after spending parts of three seasons with the Senators.
Phaneuf had 13 goals and 41 assists over 154 games with Ottawa.
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