Back by popular demand, here are your Puck Previews: Spotlighting the key games in NHL action, news and views as well as general frivolity. Make sure to stop back here for the nightly Three Stars when the games are finished.

Via ESPN and d’oh. [@TomUrtzJr]

The Battaglia Bros., winners of the Amazing Race, and Louis Jean on today's MvsW [Marek Vs. Wyshynski]

Preview: Boston Bruins at Toronto Maple Leafs, 7 p.m. ET (Tied 1-1). The first home playoff game in Toronto since May 4, 2004. Mayor Rob Ford has declared this day “Blue and White Day”. Andrew Ference returns from his suspension, which means Zdeno Chara and Dennis Seidenberg are back together as a shutdown pair.

Preview: Washington Capitals at New York Rangers, 7:30 p.m. ET (Caps lead 2-0). The Rangers were looking for the return of Ryane Clowe or Marc Staal or both for a critical Game 3. The Capitals are going with the same lineup that won them Games 1 and 2.

Sometimes, the best way to gauge hockey hysteria is through its effect on everyday events. Like when the water consumption in Edmonton spiked at the end of each period and after the overtime gold medal-winning goal in the 2010 Winter Olympic men’s hockey final, because everyone in the Canadian city was flushing his or her toilet at the same time.

The latest example comes from the world of pizza:

RedditThis receipt popped up on Reddit over the weekend, as a customer informed the local pizza joint that they couldn’t venture out to pick up their large original hand-tossed chicken pizza because the Canucks had just tied the San Jose Sharks in a playoff game.

Hence, they couldn’t leave the house. Because of hockey.

[Watch: Senators, Canadiens brawl in Game 3]

The smart money is on this being a receipt from Game 2 of their Western Conference quarterfinal series, which Ryan Kesler tied 59 seconds into the third period and then gave Vancouver the lead roughly six minutes later.

Alas, San Jose would

Throughout the Stanley Cup Playoffs, we’ll be spotlighting unsung heroes around the postseason on a weekly basis.

Minnesota Wild forward Jason Zucker, 21, entered his name into franchise lore with an overtime, game-winning goal in Game 3 against the Chicago Blackhawks on Sunday.

“Just trying to get the puck on net and it just happened to go in for me,” Zucker told the Star Tribune, of his goal 2:15 into overtime to cut the Wild’s series deficit to 2-1.

It was a sharp-angle shot that found its way past goalie Corey Crawford. It surprised the Blackhawks goalie, and surprised the rest of the hockey world, too: Zucker’s wasn’t a name many expected would be attached to a goal of that magnitude.

[Also: Leafs fan risks international scorn with 'Toronto Stronger' sign]

But Minnesota Wild fans know what he’s meant to the team this season.

Zucker, a rookie, has 26 NHL games to his credit, with four goals and three assists for his career. He played 20 of those games this season, playing a vital role as an energy player with four goals in 14 games before Corey Perry’s head-shot on March 12 forced him to miss two games. That affected his place in the lineup; according to Minnesota Hockey Magazine, Pierre-Marc Bouchard took Zucker’s place in the lineup and soon the young player was seeing fourth-line minutes.

Getty Images“How will they keep the ice from melting?”

Prepare yourselves for that question to be asked, oh, roughly a quintillion times before the Los Angeles Kings host the Anaheim Ducks at Dodger Stadium on Jan. 25, 2014, in a game the National Hockey League announced on Monday as part of its outdoor cash grab Stadium Series next season.

Here’s how they’ll do it: With a multi-million dollar ice making system that includes a 300-panel floor that is kept frozen by a truck, with 1500 gallons of water pushed through it per minute to create ice.

The system also has state-of-the-art tracking technology so it can react to temperature changes. As NHL ice guru Craig said in 2010, before the Winter Classic in Pittsburgh:

"We have instrumentation that we put into the system called Eye on the Ice that we monitor; (it) sends us signals all the time," Craig said. "Every 15 minutes we'll log and trend it so we can graph what's happening on any given day. And every city we go to, we have a complete weather breakdown of our area so we know what (weather) systems are coming through."

According to Los Angeles Almanac, the average high for Jan. 25 is 68 degrees and the average low is 49 degrees.

[Watch: Senators, Canadiens brawl in Game 3]

But forget about that high temperature: Another reason California can handle an outdoor hockey game is the 7 p.m. start time locally (10 p.m. on the East Coast), which will allow for cooler temperatures and take the sun out of the equation.

As Craig said in the past, they’d have to put a canopy over the ice in order to play during the daylight hours in California.

So calm your fears ... this won't have to be roller hockey.

LISTEN HERE!

It's a Monday edition of Marek vs. Wyshynski beginning at 2 p.m. ET/11 a.m. PT, and we're talking about the following and more:

Special Guest Star: Bates Battaglia, former NHLer and winner of "The Amazing Race", joins us.

• The Canadiens and Senators get nasty.

• The Canucks are on the brink of disaster.

• Analysis of every Stanley Cup Playoffs series.

• Oh, the NHL's suspensions are causing more strife, too.

Question of the Day: What are your thoughts on the Calder Trophy finalists? Email puckdaddyblog@yahoo.com or hit us on Twitter with the hashtag #MvsW to @wyshynski and @jeffmarek.

Click here for the Sportsnet live stream or click the play button above! Click here to download podcasts from the show each day. Subscribe to the podcast via iTunes or Feedburner.

Kyle Hay is a Toronto Maple Leafs fan who exists somewhere between the realms of incredibly brave and undeniably crazy: He attended Game 2 of the Eastern Conference quarterfinals in Boston proudly wearing his Leafs sweater with matching blue mask.

Again: A Leafs fan. In Boston. During the playoffs.

Still, that decision should never lead to this unconscionable violence: Hay was knocked out cold by a sucker punch after the Leafs defeated the Boston Bruins in Game 2.

That punch resulted in Hay getting three staples in the back of his head, a swollen cheek and a concussion (paging Brendan Shanahan). He doesn’t remember the end of the first Maple Leafs playoff victory since 2004.

Hay and his friend Bryan spoke with Steve Dangle of The Leafs Nation about the incident:

“After the game I was blind-sided with a sucker punch while I had my mask on,” Kyle, who was also celebrating his birthday, explained. “Honestly, I do not remember what happened.”

Obviously Kyle does not remember being knocked out, so he needed his friends to fill him in. Bryan helps there. “Our buddy Patrick was the only one to see what actually happened and was with him the entire time afterwards. You can see him in the video. We came down the same stairs about two minutes later and that's when we realized what had happened. “

Comments on the YouTube video and on other forums suggest that maybe Kyle and his friends were antagonizing Bruins fans after the game, and perhaps “had it coming.” Kyle says that’s not true. “There was no chirping going on when it happened. Just a pissed off fan, I guess.”

The Leafs blog Pension Plan Puppets attempted to procure Game 3 tickets for Kyle as a “birthday” present.

The 2012-13 Calder Trophy were announced on Monday, with right wing Brendan Gallagher of the Montreal, Canadiens, center Jonathan Huberdeau of the Florida Panthers and left wing Brandon Saad of the Chicago Blackhawks are the three finalists for the award given “to the player selected as the most proficient in his first year of competition,” as voted on by the Professional Hockey Writers Association.

Getty ImagesThe Calder field was, by far, the most crowded for any major award in the NHL this season. Seven players were within four points of each other at the top of the rookie points standings, with Nail Yakupov and Huberdeau tied at the top with 31.

Yakupov also led all rookies with 17 goals, thanks to a final-game hat trick that pushed him to the top. Gallagher was second with 15 goals, while Huberdeau was third with 14 goals after leading all rookies for most of the season’s second half.

On defense, Jonas Brodin of the Minnesota Wild (23:12), Justin Schultz of the Edmonton Oilers (21:26), Brenden Dillon of the Dallas Stars (21:22) and Jake Muzzin of the Los Angeles Kings (17:53) all played big minutes and contributed plenty.

So who wins the Calder this season?

Game 3 of the Eastern Conference quarterfinals wasn’t exactly a joyous occasion for the Montreal Canadiens. Many fans were flat out embarrassed on Sunday night, both by the team’s effort and by the extracurricular activities that marred the 6-1 loss to the Ottawa Senators.

That said, please forgive RDS for its attempt to revise history and convince fans it was all just a nightmare:

@MtlProbzCarey Price was last seen sitting on the floor, rocking back and forth with this image paused on his PVR.

s/t @MtlProbz