Morning Player Notes in the Draft (Mar 29)

The Buffalo Sabres went into Detroit trying to play spoiler, failed and lost forward Evander Kane to an upper-body injury at the same time. There was no word on the severity of the injury. Kane wasn't able to register anything on the scoresheet before leaving, so it might as well be a missed game.

Derek & Dan's PIM pool lead continues to sit at 67 minutes after Monday night's action, which is becoming less and less likely that they'll be caught, but I'm sure they would prefer to have all their bodies healthy to protect their lead in these last couple of weeks.

A few notes from the Flames/Coyotes game on Monday night and let's start with Johnny Gaudreau not dressing for the club, as the coaching staff say that he has been dealing with an upper-body issue of late and they had given him the night off, fully expecting him to return on this road trip, when they go through California.  He's day-to-day.

Jonas Hiller was the odd-man out of the goaltending battery last night, as Joni Ortio got the start and the team opted to have Niklas Backstrom as the back-up.  With only six games left, after Monday night, it's hard to say what the split of games will be for the three, exactly, but I doubt this will be the last time we see Hiller's name as a scratch.

And finally, Michael Frolik left the game against the Coyotes, midway through the 3rd period, with a lower-body injury.  There was no immediate word on the severity of his injury either, but there should be something soon, as they are in Anaheim on Wednesday night.

Gaudreau is the big money ticket, as Brian's team is all of a sudden looking in their rear view mirror and seeing Kristy & Don coming up quickly behind them.  It doesn't sound like Brian will be without the diminutive scorer, but one game is more than enough to be without.  Grant probably didn't miss out on a goalie start, as the rotation in Calgary will spin through the rest of the year.  Finally, Scott's team got off to a decent start, in their chase for 3rd place, but losing a player hurts as well.

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