Back by popular demand, here are your Puck Previews: Spotlighting the key games in NHL action, news and views as well as general frivolity. Make sure to stop back here for the nightly Three Stars when the games are finished.
(Pictured: Brian Elliott preparing to deliver some sweet chin music to Derick Brassard last season.)
Preview: Columbus Blue Jackets at Colorado Avalanche, 7 p.m. ET. The Blue Jackets are off to a franchise worst 0-3-0 start and if history tells us anything, it's that their woes will continue as the Avs are 7-1-0 against Columbus over the past two seasons. And good luck finding the game on television.
Preview: Boston Bruins at Carolina Hurricanes, 7:30 p.m. ET. Looking to bust out of their Stanley Cup hangover (same goes for Nathan Horton) the 1-2-0 Bruins will visit former teammate Tomas Kaberle, who's Hurricanes are winless through their first three games of the season. Former Canes Joe Corvo and Dennis Seidenberg will also see ex-teammates as they lineup on the Bruins' blueline. Not helping Boston's cause will be the absence of David Krejci who suffered an undisclosed injury during practice on Tuesday.
Preview: Vancouver Canucks at Philadelphia Flyers, 7:30 p.m. ET. The Flyers begin a stand that sees them play five of their next six games at home and going in their favor is the fact that they've has won their last two openers at Wells Fargo Center.
Check out previews and updated scores for all of today's games on the Y! Sports NHL scores and scheds page. For tonight's starting goalies, check out Left Wing Lock.
Evening Reading
• How strange has the NHL schedule been so far? By the time the San Jose Sharks play their second game of the season on Friday the Pittsburgh Penguins will have already played five. [Vancouver Sun via Postmedia]
• During a radio interview on Tuesday, NHLPA executive director Donald Fehr talked suspensions:
"Basically, you have a situation in which where you have discipline involved it's a modification of a player's contract. You don't get to work and you don't get to get paid ...
"Normally when someone wants to modify your contract you have resort to some sort of impartial mechanism to decide if that guy is right. If somebody wants to throw you out of your apartment, you can contest it. If you get a parking ticket, you can contest it. And it's not the same person who levies the penalty who gets to decide whether you're right and it's not somebody with whom he works, that gets to decide if you're right. So that's an issue."
Fehr also said that he expects CBA talks to begin sometime around All-Star Weekend in late-January. [CBC]
• Speaking of CBC, they published their Week 2 power rankings and despite all that was said on the network about Atlanta during the Winnipeg Jets' opener, they just can't quite quit you, Thrashers. s/t Puck Buddy Jay H.
• From Pierre LeBrun: "The NHL and the players' union have set the players' escrow rate at 8.5 percent for the first quarter of this season, the lowest rate since the first year after the lockout, a source told ESPN.com Tuesday." No one tell Dan Ellis. [ESPN]
Puck Buddy Comment of the Day: From reader "Noddy Holder" on the Jonathan Cheechoo song post:
Did anyone else watch the video hoping that when Wysh referred to "The Mayor", it was going to be Mayor McBoobs?
We apologize for getting anyone's hopes up that Mayor McBoobs would make a cameo.
Bold Prediction: Columbus ends their three-game skid with a victory and they snap out of their current 0-for-16 power play slide as well.
Photo credit: Getty Images