Here are your Morning Puck Headlines: A glorious collection of news and views collected from the greatest blogosphere in sports and the few, the proud, the mainstream hockey media.
• Interesting comments from New Jersey Devils Coach Brent Sutter, whose son Brandon Sutter was sent to the hospital by that vicious (but legal) open-ice check from Doug Weight. Sutter told the Star Tribune that when he played, "If a player got hit in the head, whether it was clean or dirty, you knew what was going to happen. It was going to be a long night for the guy who did the hitting. And the next time, it would be a long night." Not predicting anything, just sayin': The Devils' next game against the New York Islanders is on Jan. 17, 2009. [Star Tribune]
• The team's lines are far from set and Chris Drury finally scored his first two goals of the season, but the New York Rangers are still five points better than anyone else in the NHL right now. Maybe they didn't need Jagr after all. [Slap Shot]
• Steven Ovadia believes Tampa Bay Lightning rookie Steven Stamkos is attempting to send secret messages through his online diary. "I think 'It was her first time down to Tampa and it was a good experience for her' really means 'I'm so sick of this bench. It hurts. People weren't meant to sit on something so hard for so long. I need a cushion.'" [Puck Update]
• Speaking of unmitigated rookie busts in the first part of the NHL season, Nikita Filatov has been returned to the AHL by the Columbus Blue Jackets. [Jackets]
• It's now official: Buffalo will be the host of the IIHF World Junior Championship tournament in 2010-11. Beer, wings and watching players you've never heard of. Wait, that's the Bills ... [THN]
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• Sergei Zubov is on the way back for the Dallas Stars, and that could be some reshuffling on the defense. [Heika]
• Really nice work by Mirtle breaking down the motivations for that new European league, getting some comments from an anonymous source who played briefly in the NHL. [Mirtle]
• This hysteria over Steve Yzerman potentially taking over a Canadian hockey franchise will have to wait for at least another year and a half as he operates Team Canada. Which basically means that the Ottawa Senators shouldn't fire Bryan Murray until after the 2010 games. [ESPN]
• Eddie Cahill, a.k.a. Jim Craig from "Miracle," took in the Detroit Red Wings/Los Angeles Kings game last night and was promptly signed to replace Jason LaBarbera as the Kings' starting goaltender. (Jokes ... LaBarbera's been OK, by Kings standards.) [Life in Hockeywood]
• Rick Rypien will be sidelined indefinitely because of a sports hernia. Great, so this is the injury where teams choose not to just say "lower body?" Ouch. [CBC Sports]
• Stiles isn't pleased with the Fox Sports "Rinkside View" camera angle, and explains why in quite explicit terms. [Purple Crushed Velvet]
• There really is nothing better than a Pensblog takedown, and the boys have some hypocritical (and racially homogenous) dudes from the Oilers blogosphere in the crosshairs. [Pensblog]
• The Anaheim Ducks are offering two tickets to three games, a practice jersey and an autographed puck from a "randomly selected" player (hello, Jonas Hiller) starting at $123 bucks. Because it's almost Thanksgiving, you see. [Ducks]
• Finally, there's no sound here -- just former NHL goalie John Grahame giving up a goal from the red line in the KHL for Omsk. If you're going to do this, might as well be in a country where vodka costs about as much as a gallon of gas in Caracas.
