Tom Gilbert has 18 points in his past 15 games. He had 12 in his first 66.

Alex Kovalev is done for the season and playoffs with a torn ACL in his left knee.

Keith Tkachuk had a great final NHL game. He recorded two assists for the Blues, as they won their final home game of the season 6-3. It is always nice to see legends like Tkachuk and Modano leaving on top. He won't travel with the team for their final game of the season. He now has lots and lots of time to get the nightmare that is his dental situation figured out!

Is there a better individual rivalry in professional sports than the one between Crosby and Ovechkin?

Funny story out of Vancouver (well not funny for Canuck fans…) – Sami Salo, who was held out of Thursday's game against the Sharks to rest up for the playoffs, injured himself during the team photo and light skate on Friday morning. The Canucks will be without Salo, Willie Mitchell (still recovering from concussion issues related to a dirty Malkin hit way back in January), Aaron Rome, and Shane O'Brien during their final game against the Flames tonight. Aside from Mitchell, they are all expected to be healthy for game one of the playoffs (either Wednesday or Thursday).

After a three point game last night, Alex Ovechkin now leads the Art Ross race by one over Henrik Sedin, and he holds the tiebreaker (goals) as well. Sedin plays at home against Calgary tonight, while Ovechkin and the Caps will play the Bruins on Sunday afternoon. Unless Sedin has a three or four point game, this trophy is Ovechkin's to lose.

Use Twitter? Follow myself (@angus_j) and Dobber (@DobberHockey) on there.

Dobber's Interactive 2010 Playoff Draft List is now out – this was the first thing I ever bought from Dobber, back in 2005 or 2006, I can't really remember. Essentially it ranks players for you depending on who you see reaching the cup finals. Very easy to use and cuts out a lot of the grunt work. You check off the boxes of the teams you feel will come out of the first rounds and who will meet in the Final. Click “GO” and this MS Excel spreadsheet will auto-sort for you, ready to print, your draft list. It also includes updated injury news, playoff studs and duds, as well as Dobber’s own draft list for you to refer to. This is all you’ll need to win your playoff pool!

We have managed to lock down some seriously awesome prizes for the Playoff Challenge. An Easton S17 composite stick, a jersey (winner chooses team and player), and a copy of DobberHockey's Ultimate Fantasy Pack. The best part? You can enter up to three times per e-mail address. Time to make those picks! Check out Thursday's article for all of the information you need with regards to the Playoff Challenge.

DobberHockey member ultrawhiteness took in the Flames/Wild game two nights ago, and here are a few of his observations:

"Brent Burns played great. I had heard people say that he looked lost playing defense earlier in the year but i didn’t see any of that last night. He was really showing good patience with the puck and finding his forwards with passes."

"Casey Wellman really, really flies out there. his positioning is pretty solid and his skating was causing lots of problems for the Flames (even drawing an interference penalty)."

Brent Burns makes for an awesome, awesome buy low candidate. Even if he doesn't continue on his trajectory from 2007-08, he should still be a 12-15 goal, 40-45 point defenseman with decent a decent amount of penalty minutes.

Matt Duchene left the Avs game with a torso injury last night. It doesn't sound serious – don't expect him to miss any postseason action because of it.

One 'scoring' race that is settled relates to fights. Zenon Konopka has fought 32 times this season, seven more than Brandon Prust. Konopka is a pretty fun player to watch, and with 260 PIM, has some fantasy relevance as well.

How did you all fare in your pool(s) this season? This will be the first year in my history of hockey pools that I am leaving empty-handed. I was very close in my H2H league, but lost my semi-final matchup by one point in the plus-minus category. In my three points/roto leagues, I have hovered around 4th and 5th all season. Once again, goaltending has been my undoing.

Derick Brassard has been very tough to figure out thus far at the NHL level. He played like a top line center last year, recording 25 points in only 31 games. However, he only has 36 points in 78 games this season. The durability improvement is obviously a good thing, but the lack of production isn't. It generally takes centers longer to figure things out compared to wingers, and Brassard had to learn the center position under Ken Hitchcock, who really preaches defensive awareness in his centers.

Beauty Chad LaRose goal from Thursday night – amazing skill to roof the puck while falling: