It’s a busy night ahead in the world of hockey between the World Junior’s preparing their rosters at camp and a whopping thirteen games today in the National Hockey League. It’s been an interesting season thus far for Corey Perry as he has battled the mumps in the earlier part of the season and is now out with an injury for up to 4 weeks. Perry has been excellent for Anaheim and his fantasy owners when healthy, producing 22 points in 23 games with 14 goals. Hopefully for those who have Perry on their roster he gets this bad luck out of the way now before we head down the home stretch.
Mumps you say? In those pictures of Crosby it sure looked to me like he had mumps, but what do I know? It happens to be just swollen glands as the tests came back negative for Sidney Crosby. He’s to sit in tonight’s game and depending on how the swelling continues; Monday’s game is still questionable. It seems they take a lot more precautions these days in the NHL.
Krecji looks as if he will be returning at some point in time in the near future as he has strung together a number of practices in a row. It’s a mystery to me when he will finally return to the lineup; but I’d certainly say Boston could use Krecji back in the lineup as they havn’t been the ‘Beast of the East’ by any means this season. It’s possible he could play tonight, just keep an eye out those of you who have him on your fantasy roster.
Corey Crawford was on the ice the other day with teammates and should be at least a couple weeks before he’s back in action; both Chicago back-ups Raanta and Darling have done an excellent job filling in as Chicago has won 8 games straight. This is good for Crawford and the Blackhawks as he doesn’t feel rushed to come back; expect him to return at 100%.
Starting Goalies:
(OTT) Lehner VS (BOS) Rask (CAR) Khudobin VS (PHI) Mason (ANA) Andersen VS (WPG) Hutchinson (PIT) Greiss VS (CLB) Bobrovsky (TBL) Bishop VS (WSH) Holtby (CHI) Darling VS (NYI) Halak (DET) Mzarek VS (TOR) Bernier (FLA) Montoya VS (BUF) Enroth (MIN) Kuemper VS (ARI) Dubnyk (NJD) Schneider VS (DAL) Lehtonen (STL) Allen VS (COL) Pickard (NYR) Lundqvist VS (VAN) Miller (NSH) Rinne VS (SJ) Niemi
Remember: bold is confirmed to start, italics is probable
*I will update goalies throughout the day*
Head to head:
If you are looking to pick up a free agent in your pool for the weekend; the odds improve by picking a player who is playing Saturday and Sunday. The Rangers play Vancouver on Saturday and Edmonton on Sunday. The Leafs play Detroit on Saturday and Los Angeles on Sunday. The Blackhawks play the Islanders on Saturday and the Flames on Sunday. See who is available in your fantasy pool and pick the best player you see on the list who is available.
If available I liked Brassard from the Rangers, Santorelli from the Leafs and Versteeg from the Blackhawks.
Best of luck and enjoy the rest of your weekend!
Thanks again for reading.