from Elliotte Friedman of CBC,

- Lots of rumours about Cam Ward last week. When the Carolina Hurricanes went through Edmonton, a couple of sources said they heard there were some talks. Both teams denied it and the reason I believed it was neither team seemed at all enthusiastic about such a move.

- On to Ryan O'Reilly. The sense is teams would be pretty shocked if the Colorado Avalanche traded him during the season. Colorado's got a good thing going and O'Reilly is head coach Patrick Roy's kind of player and personality. He's also one of the forwards - along with Matt Duchene, Gabriel Landeskog, Pierre-Alexandre Parenteau and Paul Stastny - Roy's usage indicates he trusts most in the defensive zone against the best competition.

- For that reason, the logical move is to see how things go in the playoffs and at the bargaining table. The Avalanche must qualify O'Reilly at $6.5 million, but there's time to let that play out. I did check in with one team that asked about him last year. The GM's response? "They wanted too much then and, the way he's playing, it's not getting any cheaper now."

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