Linus Ullmark was expecting to have the night off but was called into action after Anton Forsberg suffered a minor injury before warm-up.
Ullmark was coming off a 3-0 shutout win over Carolina the night before and has only played in four back-to-back games throughout his career.
Ullmark provided a 26-save performance Saturday night and Brady Tkachuk scored the overtime game winner in a 3-2 win over the Pittsburgh Penguins to give the Senators (15-13-2) their first three-game win streak of the NHL season.
With the win, the Senators moved ahead of a clump of Metropolitan Division teams to grab the second wild-card spot in the Eastern Conference. The Senators have not appeared in the playoffs since 2017.
Ottawa now heads out for a stretch of nine road games. The world junior hockey championship will be taking over Canadian Tire Centre forcing the Senators to hit the road for an extended period.
Thomas Chabot opened the scoring at 7:34 of the first after Tristan Jarry was caught out of his net. It marked Chabot’s first goal in 26 games.
Just over two minutes later Ullmark made a huge stick save on Erik Karlsson stretching out to stop what looked like a sure goal.
Ullmark made another stick save late in the second on Sidney Crosby, but was unable to stop Blake Lizotte early in the third making it a 1-1 game.
The Senators were able to regain the lead four minutes later when a Chabot shot went in off Drake Batherson’s skate, but the Penguins (13-15-4) battled back with Kris Letang managing to get a shot through traffic.
TAKEAWAYS
Senators: Despite playing the night before the Senators dominated long stretches of play and created a number of chances.
Penguins: The Penguins were slow to get started but came out with a solid third-period effort to get back in the game.
KEY MOMENT
Linus Ullmark made a huge save on what appeared to be a sure goal by Erik Karlsson at 9:58 of the first period.
KEY STAT
The Senators have scored first in six straight games and are 5-0-1.
UP NEXT
Senators: Visit the Seattle Kraken on Tuesday.
Penguins: Host the Los Angeles Kings on Tuesday.
COMMENTS
When submitting content, please abide by our submission guidelines, and avoid posting profanity, personal attacks or harassment. Should you violate our submissions guidelines, we reserve the right to remove your comments and block your account. Sportsnet reserves the right to close a story’s comment section at any time.