Player Notes in the Draft (Mar 20)

The Tampa Bay Lightning are expecting to have forward Ondrej Palat back in their lineup tonight, as they take on the Red Wings at home. Palat has been out for the last week with a lower-body injury and it was thought that he would be out for a few weeks, so this turns out to be a big win for the club.  Palat has been good for the club this season, scoring 15 goals and 52 points in 64 games this year and is in the top 100 in pool scoring overall.

This is also a big win for Wes, who retook 3rd place with a big night on Thursday and he now holds a 4-point lead over Clayton for the last money spot.  Wes also has two games, including Palat, tonight, where Clayton doesn't have any.

Three games on this Friday night and the prognosis from the crease is not very good... at all.  Only one of the three games has any goalies in the pool, so the minutes are drying up fast this week.

The only game where there are two pool goalies going is the match-up in Tampa Bay, as the Red Wings are coming to call on the Lightning and it will be a Jimmy Howard versus Ben Bishop clash in this one.  Dale B., who is currently going from first to worst this week, leader of the Basement Dweller race, has Howard going for him, trying to save his week.  On the other side, it is Scott's goalie, who will try to lift his pool team up and over Dale's side, as Scott is only 2 points back of Dale and has the tie-breaker on his side, so a win would work in this case.  If Bishop was to register a goose egg tonight, he could move as high as 5th place, assuming no other points were handed out.

One game in the schedule tonight has one pool goalie, as Semyon Varlamov is expected to get the nod for the Avalanche, as they take on John Gibson and the Ducks in Anaheim.  Benson has moved into the top 10 this week and has a chance to improve upon his standing, thanks to another start from his horse of a goalie in Colorado.

In the fully non-pool game of the night, the Devils visit the Sabres in Buffalo, where it will be Keith Kinkaid taking on Anders Lindback.  Lindback and Gibson were previously in the draft, but had been dropped this season, not to be picked up again, while Kinkaid wasn't touched this year.

An updated list of injuries can be found here.