Draft Player News (Mar. 2)

The Minnesota Wild's season has been ruined by injuries and the hits just keep on coming, as Niklas Backstrom was forced to leave Thursday night's game against the Canadiens, due to a lower-body injury, which he suffered in the first few minutes of the game. Backstrom was stretched out in the butterfly and in that position (or getting back up from it), he appeared to tweak a muscle or a joint, likely groin or knee and he wasn't able to get off the ice completely under his own power.

The injury didn't look good, but there was still no update on the severity of the injury on Friday afternoon, but the Wild did call up Matt Hackett to help fill the void.

No money impact with this injury, but Leon G. is trying to make a move on 13th position this week, with a good week to this point.  His team only sits behind Brenda F. by 4 points, but that's about the only impact that this injury will likely have now.

A couple of injuries for the Blueshirts to report on, as Ryan Callahan missed out on Thursday night's game against the Hurricane with a foot injury, while Michael Del Zotto left that game with a hip injury.

Callahan is listed as out day-to-day with a foot injury, considered to be a bruised foot, which kept him out of Thursday's game, but his availability for the weekend is somewhat up in the air.

Del Zotto reportedly suffered the hip injury last weekend in a game on Saturday and that same injury was aggravated on Thursday night, forcing him to leave the game.

The Rangers go again on Friday night and an update will be provided before game time, on both players, but until then it will just be day-to-day.  If the update reflects a day-to-day status, there likely won't be any more posted on it.

Wayne H. goes into Friday night's action with a 9-point cushion in the last money spot in the standings, currently sitting in 5th place.  He also sits only 4 points out of 4th place, but for now his concern will be dropping without Callahan in his line-up.  Del Zotto, on the other hand, belongs to John P., who sits in 11th place, 12 points out of 10th place, going into Friday's action.