Angus here – hope everyone had a great Christmas and is having an equally great holiday season. I had lots of turkey last night and will probably be having even more today!

The Kings received a great Christmas gift – health! Simmonds, Smyth, and Johnson all return.

Daniel Alfredsson is expected to miss the next 4-6 weeks with a separated shoulder.

Michael Neuvirth is making his third straight start tonight, according to Caps writer Tarik El Bashir.

Craig Custance believes the best way Lecavalier can help the Lightning is to get traded… but is any team out there willing to take on his $7.7 million cap hit for the next decade?

Both Alex Kovalev and Alex Frolov were left off of Team Russia's Olympic roster. Kovalev is not a surprise, as he has been awful for most of the season, but I figured Frolov would be there because of his versatility and defensive acumen (he is a solid penalty killer).

Valtteri Filppula is playing tonight – his first game since suffering a broken wrist in late October. The Wings are mired in an offensive slump right now, and Filppula's return is huge.

Surprising stat (to me at least): Jon Quick leads all NHL goalies in playing time, with over 2,046 minutes logged between the pipes so far in 2009-10.

David Clarkson is very close to returning to the Devils lineup. Early next week seems to be the most likely date.

Russia may not have Canada's depth on defense, but a top pairing of Andrei Markov and Sergei Gonchar is all-world.

Busy, busy night tonight in the NHL. All but two teams are in action. A “bit” more to ramble about for tomorrow, but I’ll definitely do my best to dig up some interesting stuff for today.

The 2010 WJHC kicks off in a little under four hours with Canada and Latvia on TSN. I am looking forward to it.