Fantasy owners across the continent can now exhale, as Montreal Canadiens goaltender Carey Price is back in the lineup.

Price returned from injury on Saturday and played the entire game, stopping 30 of 34 shots in a 5-4 overtime win over the Ottawa Senators. While Price is back he won’t travel with the team to Buffalo on Sunday. He didn’t appear to get hurt on Saturday, so I’d think the club is just pacing him and deliberately building up his work load.

With the playoffs (for most H2H leagues) beginning next week, and Montreal due to play three games (Tuesday vs. Colorado, Thursday vs. Columbus, Saturday vs. Toronto), I’d think Price owners should feel pretty confident that they’ll get two games at minimum from the star goaltender in the quarterfinal round.

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So now our attention turns to the health and status of Kari Lehtonen.

Lehtonen was concussed in a collision with Wild forward Erik Haula last week, and hasn’t played since. He’ll travel with the Stars to Winnipeg on Sunday, but won’t be playing.

Lehtonen is with the team on their current road trip (the Stars swing through the Quaker State this week before returning home to face the Senators next Saturday), which  suggests that he’ll return by Thursday at the latest. He could give fantasy owners a couple games in the first playoff round next week, but I wouldn’t rely on it…

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So Ales Hemsky scored his first goal as an Ottawa Senator on Saturday, and now has 7 points (1G+6A) in his last three games. Freed from his blue and orange coloured shackles, Hemsky has instantly found success elsewhere.

This isn’t surprising to anyone who has been paying attention, but it’s a bad look for an Oilers organization that has consistently seemed unable to figure out how to use talented NHL pieces. This has been going on for a decade.

Hemsky, for example, had spent far too much of his season battling tough matchups, skating with checking forwards, and playing on the third line. His most common linemates were Boyd Gordon, Sam Gagner and Ryan Smyth’s corpse. Think skilled players of the caliber of Eberle, Yakupov, Hall or Nugent-Hopkins might have benefitted somewhat from playing with a veteran playmaker like Hemsky? Because Jason Spezza sure has.

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The latest example of Oilers mismanagement? Sam Gagner, who the team continues to pretend is a center. He’s not, I don’t think.

Gagner is bad in the circle, and gets exposed defensively in the middle of the ice. But he’s skilled, creative, and fast. A smart team will convert him to the wing in the snap of a finger, or at least over the course of a season.

Which is what happened to Andrew Cogliano, you might recall. Cogliano has revived his career as a tough minutes left-winger in Anaheim. His final season in Edmonton, Cogliano took more than 1000 draws. He took nearly 400 in his first season in Anaheim, but this season has taken fewer draws than he’s scored goals (20 to 19).

It took a while, but a smart team found a niche for a talented piece like Cogliano (oh he’s not a top-six center, he’s a fast defensive winger well suited to scoring against the grain!). Meanwhile a different smart team has put Hemsky into an offensive role with one of their best skilled players. Both of those moves are paying off.

And the Oilers? Still banging their head against a wall…

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Former Vancouver Canucks captain Markus Naslund has resigned as general manager of SHL club MoDo, and is now dogged by rumors that he’ll be joining the Vancouver front office. Naslund tried to quiet those rumours this weekend (good luck with that!) and revealed that other teams have been after him as well. 

I wonder if Calgary might be a fit, what with Brian Burke (who has a relationship with Naslund) temporarily at the helm.

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So the Canadiens erased a three goal deficit with under four minutes to play last night. Lars Eller and Brian Gionta had two points each during the furious comeback, while P.K. Subban set up all three goals. Subban had a monster fantasy night overall, actually, with three assists, one PPP, seven shots and four hits.

Senators forward Bobby Ryan had a huge game if your league counts PIMs. The skilled winger managed an assist, 10 penalty minutes, three shots and two hits on Saturday night. That boxscore suggests Ryan played with intent city.

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The Boston Bruins pulverized the Carolina Hurricanes 5-1 on Saturday. Jarome Iginla scored a couple of goals and rookie defenseman Torey Krug scored his 14th(!).

For the Hurricanes Alex Semin took 7 shots on goal, though was held off the scoresheet. Also talented young defenseman Ryan Murphy played a tonne of minutes, and managed five shots on goal. Murphy was also -3, so, yeah buyer beware. But if he’s getting minutes like that, he could go off in the next couple of weeks.

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I dropped Bruins winger Reilly Smith in my league because his shot rate dipped pretty significantly in January, my team is built on shot volume, and Loui Eriksson was returning and I figured Smith would be out a top-six forward slot.

Much of that has indeed come to pass, and Smith has just one assist and 17 shots on goal in his past eight games. He managed 6 shots against Carolina on Saturday, however, and played first unit power-play minutes. That’s a good sign going forward. I may regret dropping Smith yet!

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Can someone explain to me why Cam Ward (.903 even-strength save percentage this season) played three games this week and Anton Khudobin (.936 even-strength save percentage) is playing just one? Has to be a showcase, right?

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The Philadelphia Flyers pasted the Pittsburgh Papertigers 4-0, with Matt Read, Vincent Lecavalier, Sean Couturier, Claude Giroux and Scott Hartnell all having very strong games and filling the boxscore. The best fantasy day on the Penguins was probably had by Tanner Glass who wasn’t a minus player and at least threw seven hits and managed three shots. That really tells you all you need to know about how they fared on Saturday.

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The Tampa Bay Lightning shutout the New Jersey Devils and got goals from a hilarious coterie of grinders. Mike Kostka, Nate Thompson and B.J. Crombeen scored for Tampa in the victory, which, what even?

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The Islanders defeated the Buffalo Sabres 4-1 and Lubomir Visnovsky turned back the clock with a three assist performance. Calvin de Haan continues to play huge minutes for the Islanders, and at least is good for PIMs, hits and shots on goal. The offensive value hasn’t really been there of late for him, however.

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Defenseman Dalton Prout scored Columbus’ only non-shootout goal in Saturday’s shootout victory over the Minnesota Wild, and had a pretty strong fantasy game overall. Prout scored, took four shots, and threw a couple of hits for good measure. Looking over his gamelogs, Prout appears to be playing some serious minutes of late and has been over 18 minutes in four of his past five games. He’s also taking shots at a high volume and has four points (2G+2A) in his past seven games. 

Not someone with fantasy value yet I don’t think, but someone I’ll probably monitor and take a chance on if I need some SOG from a wire pickup with D eligibility in the playoffs.

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Shane Doan scored the game-winner on the power-play as the Phoenix Coyotes defeated the Calgary Flames and moved into a tie with the Dallas Stars on Saturday night. Keith Yandle managed his 40th assist on the season on Doan’s game winning tally, by the way.

Mark Giordano had a hell of a game for Calgary in a losing effort, as he managed a power-play point, nine shots on goal, two hits and two PIMs in the contest.

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Goaltender Frederik Andersen was spectacular on Saturday night, stopping 37 of 38 shots in a 2-1 Ducks victory over the Los Angeles Kings.

Lots going on with the Ducks right now fantasy wise: Cam Fowler didn’t play on Saturday and neither did Teemu Selanne. Stephane Robidas took warmups but ultimately didn’t play (he’ll presumably make his Ducks debut next week). 

Seems worth noting that in Fowler’s absence Luca Sbisa led all Ducks skaters in minutes logged on Saturday. In fact, he’s been up near twenty minutes per contest over his past three games. Might Ben Lovejoy be out a top-four spot once Fowler and Robidas return to action? Kind of looks like he might be…

Thomas Drance is a news editor at theScore.