Frank Seravalli reported that Minnesota Wild defenceman Brock Faber is heading for a season debut this Saturday in Boston. Faber has yet to play a regular season game due to the fractured skull injury he suffered in the preseason, but is on the cusp of making his debut. We will wait for official confirmation from the team but get ready to take him off the IR soon.

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We got an update on Montreal defenceman Mike Matheson and as well as the team's intentions on having three goalies:

Mike Matheson est officiellement de retour à l'entraînement complet avec ses coéquipiers.

On peut aussi dire que le ménage à trois est officiellement de retour. Les trois gardiens participent à l'entraînement et font des rotations dans les deux filets.
— Patrick Friolet (@PFrioletRDS) November 11, 2026

Matheson is joining the team for the game in Boston, though it's yet to be determined if he will play. This will impact Kaiden Guhle quite a bit as he had a much bigger role in Matheson's absence.

That three-goalie rotation could be a nightmare for fantasy managers, though it's a wonder how long they'll actually keep it.

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There was hope that Dallas Stars defenceman Miro Heiskanen would return on Thursday but it doesn't look to be the case:

Still no Miro Heiskanen at practice today.
— Lia Assimakopoulos (@Lassimak) November 11, 2026

Heiskanen hasn't played in nine days and despite the Stars having a three-day break, he still isn't able to practice. Hopefully this isn't more serious than the team is letting on.

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One of my big offseason concerns was that Brandt Clarke would not be a full-time member of Los Angeles' top PP unit as the team turns to a 5-forward setup. With Kevin Fiala nearing a return, that looks to be the case:

Kings working with a 5-forward power play on the top unit today

PP1
Panarin – Byfield – Laferriere
Kempe – Fiala

PP2
Zuccarello – Haula – Turcotte
Clarke – Perry
— Alexander Legget (@LeggetNHL) November 11, 2026

Of course, there is no guarantee that the Kings stick with this setup for any longer than a single game, and we'll see what things look like when Erik Gustafsson is healthy, but this is all bad news for Clarke's fantasy value.

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Rasmus Ristolainen was back in the lineup for the Philadelphia Flyers, appearing in just his fifth game of the season.

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For readers who may have missed it, I had a quick 45-second video over on the Dobber Hockey YouTube channel on Tuesday discussing Calgary Flames defenceman Zayne Parekh (pardon my pronunciation of Parekh's last name).

For anyone who doesn't want to watch it, here are the highlights:

In the first two games after Kevin Bahl's injury, Parekh skated 22:20 and 21:38, his two highest TOI games of the season.
Starting Wednesday, November 11^th and going through Sunday, November 29^th, the Flames have 10 games, tied for most in the league (per Frozen Tools). Those games include San Jose, Chicago, Anaheim, Pittsburgh, and Los Angeles. There are even a couple of games against the New York Rangers, which isn't a terrible matchup.
Parekh runs the top power play, which has been very good through the first six weeks of the season.
His ownership rates are 22% on Yahoo and 10% on ESPN.

Over his last 12 games (excluding Wednesday night's matchup against the Rangers), Parekh has averaged 13.5 shot attempts per 60 minutes. That is roughly an 88^th percentile rate among defencemen. He has 7 points and 16 blocks in those 12 games, too. He rarely hits – just six in 18 games – so there is a bit of a ding to his value in banger formats, but there is production, shot volume, and a decent block total here.

There is also good work under the hood that is pointing to Parekh taking a leap in his offensive profile. Using 5-on-5 tracking data from All Three Zones, I want to focus on six key areas, and they are all relative to the league average for defencemen:

Shots/assists off the rush
Shots/assists off the cycle or forecheck
Rate of zone entries
Percentage of zone entries carried in
Rate of one exits with possession
Assists on teammate scoring chances + individual scoring chances

Last year was a small sample (just seven tracked games) and it's the same this year (just three tracked games), but that small sample does show improvement in five of those six key offensive measures:

He still isn't heavily involved in the transition play with his zone exits and entries being below average this year (and entries were below average last year, too), but once the puck is in the offensive zone, he's getting heavily involved in the offence. He is still just 20 years old (turning 21 in February) with about two-thirds of a full season's worth of games played. He is still learning, and the team around him isn't potent offensively, but these are all good signs.

This is all to say that if Parekh is on your waiver wire, and you need help on the blue line, he is worth the short-term add. For at least the next 2.5 weeks, the Flames have a good schedule, and it seems his role will be a lot bigger with Bahl injured. If it doesn't work out in the short term, Parekh probably won't be much worse than the other waiver options available. If it does work out in the short term, then fantasy managers may have a reliable 4^th/5^th defenceman they can use for the rest of the season. Any defenceman skating 22 minutes a game with top PP time is worth a look on the waiver wire, and keeper/dynasty owners might want to check on his price in a trade.