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.

Sean O'Donnell and Kelly Buchberger (Getty Images)

Sean O'Donnell and Oilers assistant coach Kelly Buchberger hatch a hilarious plan to trick Sam Gagner into thinking he's really good for a night.

Preview: New York Islanders at Ottawa Senators, 7:30 p.m. ET.

It's a testament to how strong this season has been for the Senators that their recent four-game losing streak is something of a surprise to most. Last season, this would have just been business as usual. The Sens will be in tough to get back to the business of winning Friday, as the Islanders are 4-1-1 in their last six, John Tavares is red hot with 26 points in his last 15 games, and Jason Spezza will reportedly miss the game with an injury. Update: Scratch that. Spezza's in after all.

The St. Louis Blues, hot ticket item for politicians (Getty Images)

The St. Louis Blues play in an interesting state. While many states prohibit politicians accepting gifts from lobbyists -- in December 2010, New York governor David Paterson was fined $62,125 for accepting free World Series tickets, for instance -- it's an accepted and flourishing practice in Missouri.

According to Jake Wagman of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, "In Missouri, the way it works is that you're allowed unlimited gifts from lobbyists to public officials. However, the lobbyists have to disclose the value and the nature of that gift, and they have to do that in a monthly report."

In a recent blog post titled, Surest signs Blues are back? Missouri lawmakers, kin, got free tickets, Wagman observed that the December 2011 report featured a surprising amount of St. Louis Blues tickets.

It makes sense, really. According to Wagman, "In many ways, a hockey game is the perfect sporting event if you're hoping to chat up a lawmaker." Hockey is, of course, the only major sport that features two intermissions, meaning the entertainment comes with plenty of built-in facetime (unless the politicians are really into intermission tricycle races).

"The lobbyists want to provide something that will be entertaining to lawmakers -- that's why there are more Blues tickets this year and less free passes, I  suspect, to see the feckless Rams," Wagman said. It's a good point. Under Ken Hitchcock, the Blues are playing some fantastic hockey right now. Who wouldn't want to go see them?

I was curious to see if Wagman's observation held up over a larger scale, so I called the Missouri Ethics Commission and tracked down their lobbyists' reports dating all the way back to 2007. Sure enough, the hockey expenditures rise and fall drastically with the success of the Blues.

As we near the one-year anniversary of Gomez's last tally, the outcry in Montreal is really kicking into high gear. Recently, we've come across the least expensive pub promotion of all time; and the ever-helpful DidGomezScore.com, which reminds us that he's two days from a full sun cycle since his last lit lamp.

It's a full-fledged movement, but what would a movement be without a movement-defining protest song?

Thankfully, now we have one. I give you, "Scott Gomez Can't Put Anything In", a charmingly rickety acoustic ballad from a few Montreal Canadiens fans that, clearly, have listened to a great deal of The Beatles and Stephen Lynch.

There's so much gold here I don't even know where to begin. The gently off-key falsetto backup vocals. The car graffiti. The guest appearances of Randy Cunneyworth, the Queen of England and Youppi. The fact that Gomez tries to put on his shoes and they wind up hanging from a power line. It's all pretty great.

The song and video are the work of group of guys that call themselves the Insomniacs: Frederick Coté on vocals, guitar and drums, Devon Jolander with backup vocals, sound editing and lyrics, Nick Grimond with backup vocals, lyrics and video production, and Vincent Pivin-Dans with a guest appearance for the Queen's "and me."

They have promised a few more hockey culture satire songs in the coming months. We look forward to it.

Drew Doughty, sorcererThe Columbus Blue Jackets' record this season when leading the game after two periods is a dismal 10-6-2, meaning they blow leads in the final 20 minutes almost half of the time. If they enter the third period tied, they're 2-6-3. If they're trailing, they're 1-20-1. In short, they are poor in third periods.

That's bad enough, but the Blue Jackets aren't content just to fail the final frame -- they often do so spectacularly. Columbus has surrendered the game-winning goal in the final minute of regulation three times this season: In Ottawa, versus Nashville, and during Wednesday night's visit to the Los Angeles Kings, when Drew Doughty scored the game-winner with less than a second to go.

But this one might not be Columbus' fault. Watch the clock: With 1.8 seconds remaining, it freezes for nearly an entire second, and Doughty scores the goal in the phantom time:

But maybe this was only on the television clock?

Cherry and Burke rumble in the jungle

Considering Brian Burke's tendency to butt heads with members of the local media (not to mention everyone -- dude has beef with more people than a Calgarian), you had to know that, eventually, he was going to have a fallout with Don Cherry, a similarly disagreeable curmudgeon.

Disagreeable curmudgeons are like soulmates -- they tend to find one another. And, like most soulmates, eventually the relationship devolves into curmudgeonly disagreements.

So what's this disagreement about? According to a Toronto Sun report, Burke was upset about Cherry's recent criticism that Toronto Maple Leafs' coach Ron Wilson didn't applaud the troops at a recent pre-game ceremony appreciating the Armed Forces, and "raised the issue quietly and professionally," which is another way of saying sneakily. Unfortunately, someone leaked it.

Hockey stick coffee table is worth fighting with your wife over (Reddit)

• This coffee table is made of broken hockey sticks. It's pretty badass. [Reddit Hockey]

• January's three stars, in order: John Tavares, Evgeni Malkin, Pekka Rinne. [NHL]

• The Pittsburgh Penguins have claimed forward Cal O'Reilly, the older brother of Ryan O'Reilly, off re-entry waivers from the Phoenix Coyotes. [TSN]

• This post on the Los Angeles Kings trade history is depressing. Since the Bernie Nicholls trade, of the 16 players they've acquired to be big offensive producers, only 2 have increased their points per game. [The Royal Half]

• And here is a list of players the Kings might target to ruin this year. [Jewels From the Crown]

• More Kings: here's an interview with Salvatore Tecci, the man that filled in for Jonathan Quick while he was off being an All-Star. [Mayors Manor]

• The Calgary Flames have signed and recalled Krys Kolanos, the leading scorer for their affiliate Abbotsford Heat. Kolanos has been dynamite for the Heat this season and certainly earned both the contract and the callup. Motivation has been a bit of an issue for him of late, so I'm sure they're banking on this call-up re-stoking his fire. I'm linking to the Abbotsford release, because I was born in that city. [Abbotsford Heat]

• Here's another angle on the Gaustad/Pacioretty spat from last night. [WGR 550]

• And here's the best angle: Sabres, Habs chirp about who got their asses kicked more by the Boston Bruins. It's much less impressive when put this way. [Days of Y'Orr]

It doesn't take much for a Russian player to earn the label "enigmatic". It's an unfair stereotype, in my opinion, borne largely on the basis of one or two high-profile characters earning the descriptor. One such character is Alexander Radulov.

Already this season there have been reports of conflict with Salavat Yulaev head coach Sergei Mikhalev, such as when he tweeted that the man was getting on his nerves, but player/coach conflicts have happened before. It's stuff like this that gets people calling you enigmatic:

Seriously, who does that? And on the backhand, no less? That's just rude.

It's worth noting that this isn't the same head coach Radulov tweeted about. This is Ilari Näckel, the team's goaltending coach. Sergei Mikhalev is no longer with the team -- he was fired in November. Still, it's not hard to look at this video, consider the perpetrator, and wonder if this was an intentional thwack.

But, having never seen another player turn around and bludgeon his coach with his stick and believing very strongly in the goodness of people, part of me wonders if this was an accident.

Some players are just born to play hockey, and I don't mean because they're good at it. I mean because they're freaks, and their freakish anatomy is particularly conducive to playing the game. Zdeno Chara, for instance, is 90-feet tall. The Sedins are telepathic.

And Detroit Red Wings prospect Jan Mursak has a tail. See for yourself:

If you're not sure which one Mursak is, he's the one blissfully unaware that he's wagging a hockey stick for an entire shift. It's like the hockey version of plumber's crack -- it boggles the mind that he can't feel it.