If Senators center Peter Regin isn't done for the season with a shoulder injury, he could be trade bait. Phoenix had interest in Regin before the Coyotes dealt center Kyle Turris to the Senators for defenseman David Rundblad and a No. 2 pick last week. The Coyotes decided to take a pass on Regin, but that doesn't mean he wouldn't have garnered interest in February.

The season is pretty much over in Carolina and the belief is that general manager Jim Rutherford is getting ready to clean house. Rutherford will hold a fire sale before the NHL trade deadline, according to league sources. Not only are the Hurricanes going to try and move potential free agents Tuomo Ruutu, Bryan Allen, Jaroslav Spacek and Tim Gleason, they would also like to get rid of contracts that have term.

The Ducks are just 2-6-2 under new coach Bruce Boudreau. Turning the team around has proved harder than initially thought. "If you're not winning, it's tough to feel good about yourself," Ducks goalie Jonas Hiller said. "You need that experience of having success to start feeling good about yourself. On the other hand, when we had a couple of good games, we always were never able to keep that good feeling and we kind of found a way to lose again." The Ducks have won just five games since leaving out of HP Pavilion on Oct. 17 with a 3-2 win over San Jose.

The Blackhawks are on top of the central division, but that hasn't kept general manager Stan Bowman from working the phones. "I've been calling a lot of the GM's over the last few weeks to try and find out what they're doing," Bowman said. "We've contacted all the teams and we're looking to get better. If we see an opportunity to get either a forward or a defenseman I think we'd have to look at that." On the surface it would seem Bowman would be looking for help on defense. Chicago ranks 21st in the league, giving up three goals per game. "What you're trying to do is find the areas that have been weak," Bowman said. "My job is try to assess, can we fix that with personnel or can we fix that with different style of play but I think overall we're happy with the changes we made over the summer."