- Bob Cohn of the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review: This year’s Penguins-Capitals Winter Classic could be even more interesting as rain could be in the forecast. A little bit of rain can be tolerated but if it’s heavy enough to disrupt the 1 pm start, the opening faceoff could be pushed back to 8 pm at the latest. It could also reach a high of 50 degrees.
- Allen Panzeri of the Ottawa Citizen: Jason Spezza will be out indefinitely with an injured right shoulder. His shoulder is swollen enough that they don’t know the full extent of the injury and if he’ll need surgery.
“It’s not going to be immediate,” he said. “It’s going to be a while. I’ve never hurt my shoulder before, so there’s kind of a grey area right now. Still a lot of swelling and stuff. Just kind of take it day-by-day and see, but it’s not going to be any time soon.
“It seems like it’s going to be fine without surgery. But it just happened, it’s pretty fresh.”
- Bruce Garrioch of the Ottawa Sun: Pascal Leclaire was told to stay of skates until yesterday as he deals with a lower body injury, when he’ll return to the lineup is not known. The Senators could be interested in Jamie Langenbrunner, and the Devils are looking for defenseman, which the Senators have some they could be willing to move.
- Josh Cooper of the Tennessean: Jordan Tootoo voluntarily put himself in a substance abuse facility. Tootoo has full support from the team and organization, no time frame on his return is known.
- Jack McCarthy of the Chicago Tribune: Despite just being put on the IR (retroactive), Patrick Kane could be back in the Blackhawks lineup tonight versus the Blues. Marty Turco will get his 2nd straight start as Corey Crawford continues to recover from the flu.
- Josh Cooper of the Tennessean: Predators forward Steve Sullivan will be out 10-14 days with a lower body injury, and has been placed on the IR. Martin Erat was also placed on IR with a upper body injury. David Legwand is a possibility for tonight’s game. He’s only been able to play 2 periods since Nov. 18th.
- Helene St. James of the Detroit Free Press: Red Wings goalie Chris Osgood became the 10th goalie in NHL history to record 400 career wins with a 4-3 overtime victory over the Avalanche.
- TSN: P.K. Subban battled with Tomas Plekanec during practice before getting into an argument with Maxim Lapierre, Roman Hamrlik had to break it up. Subban downplayed the incident, “It’s practice, it’s battling. It’s tough,” Subban told reporters following practice. “When you’re doing three-on-two drills and three-on-three, there is going to be chippy battles in front of the net. You’ve just got to work through it. It was a good practice today.”
- David Pollak of the San Jose Mercury News: Marco Sturm continues to see limited playing time and no special teams ice time as the Kings are slowing working him back in. “I don’t know about one of these games coming up. “Kings Coach Terry Murray said when the prospect of Sturm getting some power-play time was raised this morning. “I think it’ll be further down the road than that unless he just lights it up here tonight and starts putting some pucks in the net.”