from Eiiotte Friedman of Sportsnet,

- It’s now a daily question: “What are you hearing about the Olympics?” The answer: more and more concern. There’s the COVID issue and the moral dilemma, as the women’s tennis tour remains unconvinced about Peng Shuai’s safety. With 46 days until the NHL can withdraw from competition without financial penalty, 70 days until the women’s competition begins and 76 before the men drop the puck, it’s very possible the questions get even more pointed. Diplomatic boycotts are being floated, although that means athletes could still compete. Undoubtedly, some are already wrestling with the desire to validate all of the work towards your life goal of Olympic participation, versus the moral imperative of human rights....

- You’re going to see trade chatter pick up over the next week or so. Biggest challenge: so many teams are cap tight. Hard to pull off dollar-in, dollar-out.

On Kevin Fiala: Minnesota’s at the top of the Central Division, and GM Bill Guerin is not going to make his team worse. He’s also not going to trade Fiala simply because of a slump, although the forward scored a big one in Tampa and another in the shootout Wednesday at New Jersey. So, if anything does happen, it’s going to be part of a plan to make them better.

Buffalo has to be looking for a goalie. Aaron Dell was pulled following the first period of Wednesday’s 5-1 loss to Boston. Unfortunately, Craig Anderson’s return date is not certain, and the Sabres need to give their young players help behind them. The challenge is teams still in the race might not be willing to give up any of their top three goalies for their own insurance. You want an option that can help you. How many are available?

As reported locally, Evander Kane resumed skating in San Jose. Apparently, he’s been doing so for a couple of weeks....

- At Monday’s roast of Brett Hull for the Jamie Daniels Foundation, an autographed Nikita Kucherov hat with “$18M over the cap” written on it went for almost $500. As far as I’m concerned, that’s a bargain. Great buy for a great cause.

more on the first two topics plus additional Thoughts...