Everyone is staring at Feb. 27 on their calendar and counting the hours until something significant happens. But the playoff picture needs some Drain-o before the trades can flow.

In the Western Conference, only three teams have started to achieve the necessary separation to begin considering which players are available. Indeed, Chicago has lost six of their last ten entering Tuesday night's contest in Denver, and yet they continue to sit comfortably in sixth place in the conference while six teams battle for the two postseason berths behind them.

How tight is the West? The longest current streak, either wins or losses, in the conference is two games.

The Eastern Conference isn't much better. Tampa sits 10 points out of eighth, but are actually closer to winning their division than bumping Ottawa out of eighth. But the difference between eighth and fourth is only five points, and the top four teams in that "competitive" Southeast Division are separated by only eight point; the Bolts would have to jump Winnipeg and Washington while catching Florida to get on top of that race.

And the separation isn't happening in the East, either; only two teams, New Jersey and Toronto, had a winning or losing streak of longer than two games.

So if we take the teams that could, legitimately, consider the postseason a realistic possibility out of the picture, there are maybe seven teams getting ready to sell.

And some of them aren't ready to roll over.

Carolina re-signed Tim Gleason, and Anaheim gave Francois Beauchemin an extension as well. In a market desperate for blue line help and thin on available players, two of perhaps the most valuable chips were taken off the market early.

That's because there's another factor slowing movement.

Some teams, like Carolina and Anaheim, appear to be accepting this year's disappointing results as an anomaly and, in spite of pressure to make a bold statement, continue to stay the course with a long-term plan in place.