from Elliotte Friedman of Sportsnet,

- So, how long is Johnny Oduya willing to wait? The consensus is he wants to return to Chicago and the feeling is mutual. But is there a time limit on this? Bowman didn’t deal Saad until the last second and followed the same protocol with Nick Leddy one year ago. A couple of sources indicated Oduya’s contract requests are not unreasonable, so it all comes down to his comfort with the pace of the process. Boston is believed to be among the most interested parties. Buffalo was there at some point, although the Sabres’ desire is unknown now. A couple of teams suspect Dallas is a quiet lurker, especially since the term does not appear onerous. He’d be a great fit there.

- Marc Bergevin is one of the more active GMs, in terms of working the phones. It’s difficult to know sometimes from the outside if he’s trying to do something, or simply collecting information. The Canadiens were in on a few things. They took a run at Matt Beleskey, but weren’t willing to go five years like Boston. There was dialogue with Shawn Matthias, but it’s tough to tell how far it got. And, knowing their needs, I’d be surprised if they didn’t at least inquire about Oshie. Again, though, I’m not sure it went anywhere. One agent did say Quebec’s taxes are a bigger factor than we consider, because they have to bid higher or give more term to overcome. Bergevin is very wary about that, because it will block his young players. One GM pointed out that Daniel Carr (who led AHL Hamilton in goals), and Sven Andrighetto (fourth in points) are waiver-eligible after next season. The Canadiens have to find out if they are NHLers.

- One exec on Don Sweeney: “Give him credit, he had the (guts) to pull the trigger. It would have been easy to do nothing.” There are still teams upset they didn’t know about Hamilton, and I’m curious to know if the Bruins would handle that one differently with a second chance, but his other moves were very reasonable.

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