id the meeting resulted in "good progress, but it is not yet done.""There are still things remaining," Fasel said. "We have to go back and [do] some homework."Fasel said he plans to be in Sochi next week for the IIHF World Under-18 Championship. He said despite media reports, insuring player contracts isn't the biggest sticking point for getting a deal done to bring NHL players to Sochi. Instead, it's the logistics of bringing the players to a city that is much smaller than Vancouver, host of the 2010 Games, and still is constructing living arrangements for all competing athletes."It's finding the balance between every request," Fasel said. "We are different partners there, everybody has to understand how it will be. But we are making progress."In 2010 it was a little bit different because the logistics were different. Also, Vancouver is different than Sochi -- the rooms, the hotels, the tickets, the size of the arena. So it makes it a little bit different. The arena in Sochi is not as big,Marian Hossa Authentic Jersey, so the ticket requests are not so easy. So we have to finalize that."Logistics is the biggest challenge. They would like to bring more people than only one guest per player, so we need more rooms, more tickets."Fehr said there remains a ways to go before a resolution is reached, but he laughed when told of Fasel's belief that logistics is the overarching issue right now."I don't like to categorize the issues that way," Fehr said. "Having said that, clearly given the fact they are building all of these facilities new and you have size issues and you have to work through those,Authentic Marian Gaborik Jersey, Rene will have to put his own level of importance on it."Fasel said ideally he would like to have a deal completed by the start of the IIHF World Championship, which begins May 3 in Stockholm and Helsinki, but he isn't sure that’s plausible."I don’t know if we can get there, but the sooner the better," he said."I'm an optimistic person -- always," Fasel said. "I really hope we can do the deal, but still it was very constructive today. Everybody wants to be there; I can feel that. It's just to find the common dialogue for how we can make this thing happen. It will work."---
A 5-1 win at the Buffalo Sabres on Thursday allowed the Montreal Canadiens to become the third team so far to punch a ticket to the Stanley Cup Playoffs.In spite of what appeared to be some very minor personnel changes coming into the season, the Canadiens have, from Day 1, been completely unrecognizable from the team that stumbled its way to a 15th-place finish in the Eastern Conference a season ago.2012-13 PLAYOFF PICTURE For a complete look at the current playoff matchups and breakdown of remaining games, click here.How did they execute this turnaround so quickly? Here are five of the reasons:Accountability -- On the opening day of training camp, general manager Marc Bergevin put his stamp on his new team when he announced that Scott Gomez would be sent home so th