NHL Penguins' misery continues

Due to the flu, Pittsburgh was playing without star rookie center Sidney Crosby.
PITTSBURGH (AP) -- Daniel Alfredsson scored twice, including one of the Senators' three short-handed goals, and Ottawa defeated the Pittsburgh Penguins 7-2 on Thursday night.
Ottawa's three short-handed goals were the most allowed by Pittsburgh in more than 17 years. The Penguins fell to 1-13-1 in their past 15 games.
Wade Redden and Jason Spezza had three assists each and Zdeno Charra and Dany Heatley had a goal and assist each for the high-scoring Senators, who snapped a two-game losing streak and dominated the worst team in the Eastern Conference.
Depleted lineup
The Penguins were playing without star rookie center Sidney Crosby -- who had the flu -- and were resting starting goalie Marc-Andre Fleury, meaning the matchup was future Hall of Famer Dominik Hasek against backup Sebastien Caron.
But the Penguins held a 2-0 lead midway through the second period thanks to goals from Michel Ouellet and Ryan Malone.
Ouellet's 13th was on a pass from Tomas Surovy 14 minutes into the game and Malone scored his 12th on the power play early in the second.
Then the Senators took over.
Ottawa tied the game with two odd-man break goals on one Pittsburgh power play.
Anntoine Vermette scored his 11th when he poked home Chris Kelly's rebound at 12:34 of the second period. Mike Fisher tied the game with his 18th just over a minute later on a pass from Peter Schaefer.
Charra gave the Senators the lead when he scored his 10th while on a two-man advantage with 2:16 to play in the second period. Spezza and Alfredsson earned assists on the play.
Even-strength goal
Anton Volchenkov scored Ottawa's first even-strength goal when he shot a rebound past Caron 28 seconds into the third period.
Heatley scored with 9:13 to play while on a two-man advantage and Alfredsson picked up a short-handed goal, his second tally of the game and 34th of the season, with 4:54 left.
The last team to score three short-handed goals against Pittsburgh was the Toronto Maple Leafs on Nov. 16, 1988.
Notes: Coming into the game, the Penguins had a power play conversion rate of 26.6 percent in games they won and 15.1 percent in games they lost. ... Ottawa is 11-7-3 in its last 21 games against the Penguins. They were 4-24-6 in franchise history versus Pittsburgh prior to that. ... When the Senators took a 5-2 lead in the third period, fans broke into a "Here we go Steelers, here we go" chant. The Pittsburgh Steelers will play in Super Bowl XL Sunday.