Along with Miikka Kuprusoff and Niklas Bäckström, Antero Niitymaki was named to the Finnish Olympic Team.

On the team is Teemu Selänne, Mikko Koivu, Saku Koivu, Jarko and Tuomo Ruutu, Sami Salo and Kimmo Timonen. For the full roster see here. Finland walked away with the silver medal in 2006, after they lost the gold cup game to Sweden.

The Lightning's Andrej Meszaros has been named to Team Slovakia for the Olympics. He will join Zdeno Chara and Milan Jurčina on the blue line. Also named to the team is Marian Hossa, Marian Gaborik, Miroslav Satan, Zigmund Palffy, Lubomir Visnovsky, Lubos Bartecko and  Pavol Demitra, for a full list see here.

Their goaltenders, which may be their downfall is Jaroslav Halak (Canadiens), Peter Budaj (Avalanche) and Rastislav Staňa (Severstaľ Čerepovec/KHL).

Enemy blog: Check out Something's Bruin

This is the second game of the back to back that the Bruins will play on the road during their quick road trip to Florida. The Bruins (19-11-7) beat the Panthers last night 2-1, from the recap I saw, it looked like the Panthers just ran out of gas during the game. Thomas played last night in net for the Bruins, so the Lightning may see Tuukka Rask tonight.

This is the second meeting between Boston and Tampa, the first one was back in Boston on December 2nd with the Bolts taking the loss. The lineup looks much the same as the last game against the Thrashers. Helenius has been sent down back to Norfolk, so expect Niitymaki back, no word yet if he is the starter.

The games on deck for the WJC today is: Canada v. Switzerland and Finland v. Russia

Line-up Notes:

• Matt Walker is out with a lower body injury (day-to-day)
• Jeff Halpern and Todd Fedoruk are both out with a lower body injury (two weeks)
  

Game time: 7:30pm ET on SUN (HD)

For an interesting take on the game, I'd suggest watching NESN for tonight's game if you can get it. From what I've found, they're a pretty good broadcast that assumes you know something about hockey so they don't explain all details like it's Hockey 101.

Sweden announced it's provisional 2010 Olympic roster today and Tampa Bay's Mattias Ohlund returns to the blue line bringing experience Olympic experience with him. The final roster will be announced on February 15th, one day before the tournament, which will be based on who is injured and who is not. Sweden will try to defend its gold medal in Vancouver that they won four years ago in Turin, Italy.

Sweden right now has tons of experience on it's team as well as a ton of injuries. Niklas Lidstrom, Mattia Ohlund and Daniel Alfredsson are on the roster to play their fourth Olympic Winter Games.19 of the announced players are from the NHL, 3 from the Swedish Elite League and 1 from the KHL. Injury wise right now, the Swedish team has 4 players out: Kronwall, Alfredsson, Forsberg and Zetterberg. And yes, I did just write Forsberg.

Henrik Ludqvist (NYR) will be in goal along with Jonas Gustavsson (Leafs) and Stefan Liv (HV 71).

Victor Hedman was not named to the roster.

Mike Smith was in net and Riku Helenius was the backup. Yes it was a scary thought, but Smith pulled out a huge with for the Lightning tonight. I didn't catch the whole game as I've been a little sick and the thought of listening to Mishkin yell into my laptop did not sound appealing, so only a few quick thoughts from the recap I saw.

• Lecavalier had 3 assists and was a +3 tonight
• Mike Lundin who was just recalled from Norfolk got 1 goal and was a +2
• Steve Downie had 1 goal and 1 assist, but it's still hard for me to think of him as an offensive winger
• This was a huge win since they got the win in regulation instead of making this a 3 point game to a SE division opponent

I hope you all had a great Christmas, today is Boxing Day in Canada...which also notes the start of the WJC which is in Saskatoon and Regina this year and the return of hockey after a little Christmas break. A little bit of a lineup shuffle for the Lightning for the game tonight...ok maybe it's a little bit more than a little one....

Enemy blog: Check out Thrashing The Blues

The lines tonight will look like: Tanguay-Vinny-Downie, Malone-Stamkos-St. Louis, Jones-Szczechura-Veilleux, Wright-Konopka-Hale. Oh the Lightning...it's beginning to get a bit comical.

The games on deck for the WJC is: Czech Republic v. Sweden, Canada v. Latvia, Russia v. Austria and USA v. Slovakia

Game time: 7:30pm ET on SUN

The Lightning have put together another win, that's two in a row for those of you who are counting. The Bolts were down by one goal to the Islanders, twice, and managed to come back both times. Thoughts on the game:

• The three guys who got on the score sheet for the Lightning are the guys you want to see get on the score sheet every night: Stamkos, Lecavalier and Malone

• Ryan Malone had two PPG's

Ohlund to Smith: "Now this is your pad, you could stop pucks with it..."

• Mike Smith got a win, that's 6 this year for him. Wow that sounds terrible for our 'starting goaltender'.
• Fedoruk thought he got a goal, but he didn't
• Lecavalier's shot came from a pass from Tanguay at 19:41 in the 2nd, and he just ripped it towards the net. He also got an assist off of Malone's 2nd goal
• Some guy name Nate Thompson (who?) got his first goal this year (again, who?)
• The Islanders were 0 for 17 on the powerplay during the last 4 games, I'm glad we could help them out ending that streak. You can always count on the Lightning for helping out like that.

Moment That Made You Think Erik Erlendsson Had Lost It on Twitter:

#TBLightning seriously getting outworked to this point, Islanders are forechecking the %#!@# out of them right now, NY 13-6 shot advantage