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Update – Evgeni Malkin will miss the next 2-3 weeks with a foot injury. Look for Brandon Sutter and Marcel Goc to move up the rotation at center. 

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Montreal finally ended Boston’s winning streak and they did so thanks to a stellar effort from Peter Budaj. The Canadiens opted to rest Carey Price and use him on Tuesday night against the Sabres, probably hoping they could grab an easy two points, and the strategy paid off.

Despite getting the shootout winner against the Bruins, Alex Galchenyuk has taken a small step back this year. He’s only got 28 points right now and had 27 in the entire shortened campaign last year. He’s also a minus-12 on the season and in the midst of a one-goal in 11 games slump. Galchenyuk saw just over 12 minutes on Monday, the fewest he’s seen in quite some time.

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Milan Lucic is had seven hits and looks to be getting into playoff mode. When he’s throwing his weight around he’s a completely different player and nearly impossible to contain. 

Reilly Smith is stuck on 19 goals and hasn’t recorded a shot in three of his last four outings. He’s had an impressive season but I wouldn’t expect much more from him next year than 40-45 points at best. Boston shouldn't lose many key forwards in the offseason, so it’s going to be tough for Reilly to jump up in the pecking order. 

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The Coyotes fell to the Rangers on Monday, but they lost much more than the game. Mike Smith went down after getting tangled up with Derick Brassard and was forced to leave. No word yet on how serious it is but it didn’t look great as Smith left the ice in some discomfort. Phoenix is in a huge battle for a playoff spot right now, so Thomas Greiss may get a handful of starts here in the last few weeks if Smith is out for a while.

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Brassard also scored in this one, to give him four goals in four games. He's played very well lately and earned himself some more minutes. He had the second most power play time for the Rangers on Monday, but that could have had something to do with a bunch of Rangers like Martin St. Louis and Derek Stepan battling the flu. They saw their minutes limited but Brassard has certainly taken advantage of his opportunities. That secondary scoring is going to be key come the playoffs.

Ryan McDonagh is carrying this team right now. He played close to 30 minutes against Phoenix and had three points, including the overtime winner. He's now got six points in his last four contests.

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The Senators beat the Lightning to keep their extremely slim playoff hopes alive.

Erik Karlsson picked up three points and his 20^th goal of the season. That's a crazy achievement for a blue liner.

Ales Hemsky has just one point in five games now after arriving in Ottawa on a torrid pace. Other than injuries, that's been the trouble with Hemsky his whole career. He can look like an all-world player for a week or two and then nearly disappear the next. He's always going to be a skilled guy, but lacks the consistency to become an elite player.

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Water is wet and Ondrej Palat picked up a pair of points for the Lightning.

Ryan Callahan has six points in 10 games with Tampa. That doesn't sound like much but for a guy that isn't a natural point producer, that's actually a decent pace. He also saw nearly eight minutes of power play time against the Sens.

Nikita Kucherov scored his first goal in 15 games. He'd be someone to look at strongly for next season as with Martin St. Louis gone, I'd expect him to see more of a featured role and that should pay dividends over 82 games.

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The Kings beat the Flyers 3-2 and that's an offensive explosion as far as that team is concerned.

Marian Gaborik hasn't been much help to the Kings' scoring woes, notching just two goals since arriving at the trade deadline. I doubt Los Angeles is too concerned about that at this point, as they were likely counting on his contributions come playoff time. If Gaborik can have a good postseason it could be a difference maker for the Kings, and he's a guy that's actually done okay in the spring, posting 35 points in 54 playoff games.

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Jakub Voracek is one of the more unheralded players in the league these days. He turned out to be a solid return in the Jeff Carter deal. Voracek has followed up a breakout campaign last year with a new career high in points this year. He's got 13 points in his last ten games and should finish with well over 200 shots in 2013-14.

Vincent Lecavalier with the rarely seen triple post. Great for shinny hockey without goalies, not so good in an NHL game.

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The Stars improved their playoff chances with a W over the Jets. Their dynamic duo led the way with two assists from Jamie Benn and a goal from Tyler Seguin.

Ray Whitney had his first goal since February 8^th and the Stars were certainly hoping for more from him this season. If they crack the postseason he could be valuable, but keep in mind he's 41 and not everyone is a robot like Jaromir Jagr.

Kari Lehtonen with his second straight excellent performance. The Stars' playoff hopes may rest on his health, which is a scary thought for a Dallas fan.

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Al Montoya has done a great job filling in for the injured Ondrej Pavelec. Montoya's numbers have actually been outstanding this season in 26 appearances with a .921 save percentage. Would the Jets consider trying to deal Pavelec and his nearly $4 million salary and sign Montoya to an extension? There could be better value going that route if they can swing it.

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The Calgary Flames – you can only hope to contain them! They took out the San Jose Sharks this time around.

Joe Colborne scored for the Flames and he has more than half of his 24 points this season since January 22. He's done an excellent job earning a spot for next season, which many players have been fighting for since Calgary has long been eliminated from contention. It will be interesting to see what the Flames do with him next year.

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Is it time to start taking Sharks forward James Sheppard seriously? He's got six points in eight games and this run came shortly after a five game point streak.

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Henrik Sedin will reportedly be out two weeks with a lower-body injury. That's par for the course on how the Canucks' season has been going.

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The Carolina Hurricanes signed Justin Faulk to a six-year, $29 million contract extension on Monday. Am I crazy, or does this seem like a lot? I like Faulk, but he's got three goals this year, has never hit 30 points in an NHL season and will be hard-pressed to do so this year. He's also a minus-20 for his career. Granted, there is a lot of potential with Faulk but it's scary what a defenseman can earn on with a contract these days.

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The James Reimer criticism is somewhat perplexing. It likely has a lot to do with the timing of his struggles and the team's overall. The Leafs are quickly plummeting in the playoff race, magnifying Reimer's rough games over the last week, but in the grand scheme of things he's really only had a few bad starts. During this five-game slide, I actually thought he was pretty good against Detroit and Washington, keeping the Leafs in the game when they got behind early. However, in the last three outings he hasn't been strong and I think that says more about Toronto as a whole than anything else. The Leafs are a below-average defensive team and they need great goaltending to balance out the disparity in shots on goal and scoring chances they are usually on the wrong end of on a nightly basis.

Take the game against Montreal on Saturday night. The first two goals Reimer gave up were obvious saves he should have made and were demoralizing to the team. Still, one was on a partial breakaway when the Leafs were napping defensively and the other was from right in the slot after a brutal and lazy Toronto turnover. If the Leafs don't make those blunders, Reimer never even has to make a save to begin with. Toronto just seems to rely on great goaltending to bail them out frequently, which isn't always going to happen unfortunately.

As for the question to who should start on Tuesday, Reimer or MacIntyre? Leaf fans should be hoping the answer is Jonathan Bernier right now.

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Colin Fraser broke his hand playing in the AHL and will have to wait until the playoffs to rejoin the Kings, which he likely would have done anyway.

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Here's one Clarkson that is actually doing something positive this year.

Michael Amato is an Associate Editor for DobberHockey and a News Editor for theScore. You can follow him on Twitter at @amato_mike