Noon Player Notes (Oct 25)

The Carolina Hurricanes have recalled goaltender Scott Darling from the AHL after only one minor league conditioning start, to re-join the club ahead of Friday night's game, when they host the San Jose Sharks.  Darling suffered a lower-body injury in the preseason and missed the first few weeks of the year, but it now sounds like he is ready to get back at it again with the Metropolitan Division-leading Hurricanes.

This does present some interesting issues for the Hurricanes, who acquired Curtis McElhinney off of waivers earlier this season, shortly after the injury to Darling.  It looks like they might carry three goalies, with Petr Mrazek currently carrying the load.

The return of Darling is good, in theory, for Ryan, who will now have two healthy goalies again, but Mrazek belongs to Stacey C., who has been getting some okay returns from his number two guy.  McElhinney was dropped by Grant in the preseason Waiver Draft, but could play a role later on, if he still gets starts and could be a pickup in Week Nine.

The Philadelphia Flyers are also recalling a goaltender back from this conditioning stint down in the AHL, as Michal Neuvirth has made a start in the AHL and has been given the green light to return to the big club.  The Flyers will also have some goaltending decisions to make with the return of Neuvirth, as it has been Brian Elliott and Calvin Pickard in the crease to start the year and neither are waiver exempt in the league to get to the minors.  All signs point to Pickard hitting the waiver wire, when they want to go back to two goalies, but there has been no indication when that might happen there either.

The return of Neuvirth is good news for Grant's team, which opted to go the backup route in the hockey pool, and now that he has two backups healthy on his roster now, his 8th place team might have a better run at the money, once and a while, from the back end.