"I'm gonna get this Poonerman character if it's the last thing I do."

Brian Burke was pretty direct about what it was that got him fired as the General Manager of the Toronto Maple Leafs back in January. "We didn't win enough games," he told the media at the press conference following his dismissal, and that about summed it up.

But if you were to listen to Internet commenters like "POONERMAN" or "CAMBARKERFAN" -- two individuals whose usernames should tell you all you need to know about their airtight credibility and intelligence -- there was more to this story than simply a failure to get the Leafs to the playoffs.

These guys claimed that Burke was actually fired because he had an affair with a Sportsnet reporter. Salacious.

Burke denies this, however, and he won't tolerate the rumour's continued dissemination. On Friday, the former GM launched a lawsuit against the commenters behind this rumour in B.C. Supreme Court. From Metro News:

“The Defamatory Statements were made with the knowledge that they were false or with a reckless disregard for their truth,” the notice of civil claim reads.

“The Defamatory Statements have been published, republished, downloaded, viewed and commented on by persons in British Columbia and Ontario and throughout Canada and the United States by various means, including through email, internet bulletin board postings, Facebook pages and Twitter messages, and have harmed the Plaintiff’s reputation in, amongst other jurisdictions, British Columbia, Ontario, and other parts of Canada and the United States.”

“In publishing the Defamatory Statements, the Defendants were motivated by actual and express malice, and had the intention of damaging the Plaintiff’s reputation.”

I think it's safe to say that Burke's never heard of the Streisand Effect. Good luck with this one.

Burke is suing for damages, as well as an injunction that would prevent the 18 defendants from posting any more defamatory statements.

So who are the defendants? Why, I'm glad you asked, because they're only listed by username, and those usernames are incredible:

The usernames listed in the claim are: “NOFIXEDADDRESS”, “CAMBARKERFAN”, “LAVY16”, “MBSKIDMORE”, “TULOWD”, “LOOB”, “NAGGAH”, “MOWERMAN”, “AARONP18”, “STEVE”, “KABOOMIN8”,“THEZBRAD”, “SLOBBERFACE”, “POONERMAN”, “ISOLATEDCIRCUIT”, “KANADA KEV”, “NCOGNITO” AND “SIR PSYCHO SEXY”.

I'm skeptical that "Sir Psycho Sexy" is fit to stand trial. If he's really that psychotically sexy, it's going to be tough to find him liable. But you'd best watch yourself, "Steve". You'll be the easiest to track down.

It is my sincere hope that Burke wins this suit and the defendants are ordered to meet him in a barn.

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.

• He may look callow and boyish in this photo, but Cam Atkinson has proven himself in Columbus. The diminutive forward has re-signed for two years at $2.3 million. [Blue Jackets]

Preview: New York Islanders at Buffalo Sabres, 7 p.m. ET

The Islanders are in and the Sabres are not, but there's still plenty to play for. Ryan Miller will be starting his 500th game for the Sabres, and possibly his last. As for the Islanders, a win sees them leapfrog up to 6th place for the time being. A loss and they're be flying to Pittsburgh for Round 1.

Preview: Edmonton Oilers at Minnesota Wild, 8 p.m. ET

The Wild can still move all the way up to sixth place in the Western Conference, but first they just need to clinch. A win versus the Oilers will do that for them, and they couldn't have picked a better time to face Edmonton: the Oilers have dropped 3 straight, 9 of their last 10, and 29 of their last 46.

The Masterton Trophy is an interesting award. With its somewhat open-ended criteria -- it's presented annually to the player "who best exemplifies the qualities of perseverance, sportsmanship, and dedication to ice hockey" -- there are a lot of ways to justify a nomination.

Some go with the perseverance angle, nominating a player who's been through a lot. Others take the opportunity to pay tribute to a leader in the room. Others still salute an NHL veteran on a lengthy career. Either way, the result is an interesting assortment of submissions.

This year, the front-runner has to be Josh Harding, whose perseverance after being diagnosed with multiple sclerosis has been an inspiration all year long. From his bio:

Harding selflessly divulged his illness because he didn’t want a distraction to affect the team during a potential shortened season. He made clear his career wasn’t over. “It would make me happy to overcome this. Not just overcome this, but to really succeed with it,” Harding said. “I want this to be a story where when we look back, it was a happy story.”

In his first start this season, Harding made 24 saves to shut out Dallas. He did have complications with a new medication that caused him to miss two months, but Harding persevered through and after a two-game conditioning stint including a win to help Houston clinch a playoff spot, Harding was recalled to Minnesota April 22.

It's tough to beat that.

Several players this year have been nominated for their work with the NHLPA during the NHL lockout, which should garner them some consideration. And Pekka Rinne is bound to get a second look, simply because his bio includes this section:

In the summer of 2006, after Rinne’s first year in North America with the Milwaukee Admirals, he was at a bachelor party in Finland when he was a victim of an assault by a pizzeria owner. The assailant fired pepper spray into Rinne’s eyes and tackled him. Rinne had to undergo shoulder surgery, which kept him out four months.

"I was still young and right away you’re thinking ‘this is it,’” Rinne said in a 2011 article about the incident. “It’s a scary feeling.” Rinne battled back from the injury and the mental scarring of the incident to become an NHL regular in 2008-09.

Having never been attacked by a pizzeria owner, I can only imagine the mental scarring. You don't ever expect pizzeria owner to nearly end your hockey career. You expect him to serve you a fresh pizza pie.

Coming up, each team's nominee for the Masterton trophy.

Like many minor-league teams, the CHL's Arizona Sundogs have to get creative in order to fill their arena. The latest innovation, as the Prescott Valley club strives to sell 800 season tickets this offseason: torture.

On Sunday, April 21, at noon, four members of the organization were hoisted 33 feet into the air on a scissor lift at the corner of the Prescott Highway, with no intention of coming down until they had sold 300 season tickets.

"We hope we can get it done quickly and move on to the next big project," Sundogs co-owner Brad Fain, one of the four brave souls, told the Prescott Valley Tribune before the stunt began.

That's, uh, not what happened.

By sunset on the first day, they'd sold 17 season tickets. Five days later, they're still up there, using a pulley system to raise food and lower waste, fighting off the elements, and praying for an end to their arduous ordeal.

Here are your Puck Headlines: a glorious collection of news and views collected from the greatest blogosphere in sports and the few, the proud, the mainstream hockey media.

• A desperate Dallas squad pulls out all the stops to score a game-tying goal. [Reddit]

• Jared Staal has been recalled by the Carolina Hurricanes. He'll make his NHL debut Thursday alongside his brothers, Eric and Jordan, versus his other brother Marc's club (although Marc won't play, obviously). It's Staal-a-palooza! [Hurricanes]

• Sidney Crosby is back skating, but there's still no timetable for his return. [TribLive]

• Cory Schneider has injured his undisclosed. Roberto Luongo draws in. This could get interesting. [PITB]

• Dion Phaneuf is maturing, and the playoffs are a huge opportunity for him to make sure people notice. [Sportsnet]

• In honour of Alex Ovechkin's crazy run, Sean McIndoe takes us back through time as we remember the other players that have led the league in scoring. [Down Goes Brown]

• Sergei Bobrovsky has us once again asking if a goalie should win the Hart trophy. [The Hockey News]

• Josh Harding is the Minnesota Wild's nominee for the Masteron award, which is pretty much a no-brainer. Dude's an inspiration. [Hockey Wilderness]

• Mayor Bloomberg wants to transform the Bronx armoury into the one's largest indoor ice sports complex. Please tell me they're calling it "Ice Town". [NY Post]

• Travis Hughes on how Philadelphia showed a little brotherly love to the city of Boston last night. [Broad Street Hockey]

• The Washington Capitals have re-signed Eric Fehr. Two years. $3 million. Cap hit of $1.5 million. [Capitals]

If you're a diehard Jarome Iginla fan living in Calgary, the sort of fan that collects all the Iginla memorabilia he can get his hands on, well, boy oh boy have I got a treat for you: Iggy's house is up for sale.

The house boasts 4 bedrooms and 5 bathrooms, so if you're a married father of three and everyone in your house wakes up to go to the bathroom at the same time, no one will have to wait.

Talk about the ultimate piece in your Iginla keepsakes collection. I'll bet you can even get him to autograph a wall. All it will cost you is somewhere in the ballpark of $3.9 million.

If you're wondering whether the long-time Calgary Flame thinks he might be returning this summer to the club he spent two decades with, I'd say that this suggests not. Sorry, Calgary. It looks like he's gone.

But let's not dwell on things sad and weirds things we can't change. Let's creep around his house!

You know how it is. You're sitting in your bed, it's late at night, you listen to a friend's track. You think it's good -- so good it gives you goosebumps. So that's what you tweet.

Buuuuuut just in case something thinks the goosebumps are because you're totally gay for your friend, you tag it with "no homo", which should cover that assumption just fine.

Or maybe you don't do that, because that's really not okay.

It's a lesson that Tyler Seguin learned Monday night. After retweeting a friend's song, he tweeted (and then quickly deleted) the following:

Again, that's an actual tweet from Tyler Seguin, and no, unfortunately, he isn't a member of The Lonely Island.

For the uninitiated (you lucky people, you), the phrase "No Homo" has been around since the early 90s, mainly in street slang and hip hop. It is, as you can imagine, tacked onto the end of sentences to quickly establish that no homosexual intent was meant by whatever was expressed.

It implies that whatever you said in advance of "no homo" is somehow inherently a gay thing to say (seriously, goosebumps?), and that there's something wrong with that. The phrase is rooted in creating a needless distinction between the homosexual (icky!) and the heterosexual (acceptable!). It's a jittery, instant disclaimer that that exposes a childish fear of being seen as a closeted homosexual. Unless you're espousing your preference for 1% milk, "no homo", it's a little homophobic.

That in mind, Seguin was blasted for the tweet almost immediately, which is why it was gone so soon after it appeared in his timeline.

Not long after, the 21-year-old -- and his age is probably worth keeping in mind amongst all this -- sent out the apology the misstep called for.

You know when your half asleep and say or write something without thinking twice or realizing what you said. Apologies on last tweet. Gnight

— Tyler Seguin (@tylerseguin92) April 23, 2013

Good call. Apologizing is a whole lot easier than making the subversive claim that the term is actually a way to challenge outmoded standards of masculinity. Tough to fit that nuanced argument in a tweet.

On the bright side, Seguin probably just provided a little material for those You Can Play rookie seminars.

And really, like we needed to be reassured that Tyler Seguin likes women.

No. 1 Star: Mark Letestu, Columbus Blue Jackets

The Jackets' improbable march to the postseason continued with a 4-3 win over the San Jose Sharks, led by a three-point night by Mark Letestu, who was in on the first three Columbus goals. Ryan Johansen scored the game-winner, however, putting the Jackets ahead with under 90 seconds to go in the game:

Amazing. With the win, the Blue Jackets swept their season series with San Jose. And, more importantly, they bolstered their playoff hopes in a big way.