Joffrey Lupul has been assigned to Syracuse for conditioning. He was held without a point last night.

Craig Anderson (groin) has been placed on IR and will be out until at least Friday

Kristian Huselius (high ankle sprain) is still not skating according to the Distpatch.

Ondrej Pavelec’s numbers, last four games: 4-0-0, 0.50, 0.983. The man’s on fire! He’s also played in 11 straight games.

New line combos in LA – Kopitar, with Brown and Simmonds. Brown played on his off wing (the left side).

Simon Gagne is targeting Thursday for his return to action.

Jordan Staal is still on track for a mid-December return to the lineup.

Ilya Kovalchuk has one goal in his last 15 games.

Michael Leighton could go to the AHL for conditioning as early as this week. The Flyers will eventually have a three-headed monster in net – and they’ll always go with the hot hand. In the end, I think Bobrovsky will have 60 percent of the starts going forward though.

First impression of the night, a night of watching several games …gotta love Saturdays… is a game that I didn’t see, nor was it even in the NHL. Tomas Tatar had SEVEN points last night for Grand Rapids. Yeah. Not a typo. Whatever the AHL is doing this year (Omark five goals, Perrault six assists, Tatar seven points), ummmm… bring those rule changes to the NHL. I want to see five or six STAR caliber nights like that every year. Really special.

With that, the Red Wings have three prospects on the cusp up front – Tatar, Nyqvist and Mursak. Mursak had four points in last night’s contest. Anyway, I think Mursak can fit in as a third liner who could move up if he gets lucky with points early. I’m talking about next year. Nyqvist will probably turn pro, have a strong camp, and dominate the AHL next year. Tatar will dominate the AHL next year again…and during his cups of coffee in 2011-12 he’ll make it hard to be sent down. By 2012-13 he’ll be a full-timer, possibly on the second line. It’s hard to gauge the Wings because they are so patient, but that’s my best breakdown off the cuff.

So Ryan Whitney really sucks, eh? Zero goals so far. Man, that guy is having a terrible year. Oh, and he has 18 assists and leads Edmonton in scoring. But anyway…

Devan Dubnyk takes a tough loss, the day after Gerber gets a win…so Dubnyk running away with the starting job is not the slam dunk I thought it would be… not that this is a team to invest your fantasy hopes in regardless…

Johan Hedberg has allowed just four goals in his last four starts and is 3-1-0 in that span. The Devils still aren’t scoring – but they’re winning now. Kinda reminds you of 2003.

That doesn’t bode well for Kovalchuk, Zajac, Elias, or Langenbrunner owners. The leading scorer on this team could have just 68 points. Who would have thought that in September? And for Kovalchuk to get there, he would need 58 points in 59 games.

I know it seems like a great race between Stamkos and Crosby (40 points for Sid, 39 for Steven), but…I’ll bet anyone that Crosby wins. And I’ll go one step further – Ovechkin beats Stamkos as well. As for Malkin – he is 17 points behind Stamkos, but I bet Stamkos does not beat Malkin by that margin come April. In fact, give me a 10-point spread, and I’ll bet on Malkin for that, too. The point is not how bad Stamkos is – I love him as a player and strive to watch more TB games these days because of him. But it’s to stress to my fantasy followers that the Big 3 are untouchable and you should not be swayed by 25-game hot runs. Stamkos is the Brett Hull to the Wayne Gretzky of the late 80s. Hull had three seasons in a row – 72, 86, 70 goals. Awesome. Stamkos is that awesome. But not Big 3 awesome. When i’m swayed, I’ll let you know.

The streaky Rene Bourque is starting to shake his funk. When he does that, he lights it up for about two weeks. If you were considering scratching him because of his two points in his last six games – don’t.

Carey Price – first in wins, fourth in SP and fifth in GAA. Tim Thomas – fifth in wins, first in SP and second in GAA. So who is your Vezina winner this year?

Alexei Kovalev should join Twitter. Perhaps then he could give us a heads up as to which games he’s going to show up for. Had we known earlier yesterday, we certainly would have dressed him.

Chris Stewart broke his hand – it was during a fight with Brodziak.

Corey Crawford has won four in a row – I keep saying he is my pick for this year’s Jimmy Howard. Not that he will mirror the feat, but he’s the best candidate to mirror the feat.

Also a note regarding the Fantasy Guide – when I removed the Keeper League Fantasy Pack, and the Ultimate Fantasy Pack 2010C from the shop, the system removed it from all downloads as well. This is a flaw in the new shopping cart that my people will fix on Monday (I’m told). I didn’t discover this problem until Thursday, which was a holiday in the States, so otherwise the problem would have been fixed immediately. But it’s Monday – so you’ll see the Guide back in your downloads at that time.

Battle of the pests – Tootoo vs. Avery:

Stewart breaks his hand here: