The Blues fortified their depth by adding former 30-goal AHL scorer Jonathan Filewich form the talent-rich Penguins organization.

It sure didn’t cost much; the team gave up a conditional sixth-round pick in the 2010 draft. The organization became perilously thin up front with the simultaneous loss of Andy McDonald, Paul Kariya and T.J. Oshie.

Filewich, 24, once scored 42 goals in 68 games for Lethbridge in the Western Hockey League. Then he scored 52 goals in his first two seasons for Wilkes-Barre/Scranton in the American league.

He got a five-game sip of coffee with the Pens last season, but his minor league production plunged the last two seasons.

He is a big winger with wheels – he once won the fastest skater competition at the AHL All-Star Game — so maybe he can make the most of this scenery change. The Scranton Citizen Voice offered this endorsement:

“Filewich is a professional. He’s always worked hard and has been good in the locker room. But his scoring touch has completely deserted him the last year and a half. Maybe he can find it in Peoria or St. Louis.”

He’ll start at Peoria and go from there. The Rivermen also got Cam Paddock, Ben Bishop and Jonas Junland back from the Blues. Paddock recently cleared waivers and Junland returns to Peoria after a 12-minute, 28-second trial in Washington.

Hockey Guy was eager to see more of Junland, but apparently we’re in the minority on that.

SUNDIN IN VANCOUVER

For all their talk, Rangers executives couldn’t clear the cap space needed to sign Mats Sundin. HockeyBuzz.com reports deals with Dallas (taking back Sean Avery for Michal Rosival and others) fell through, as did a deal with Columbus.

So Mats will have to put up with the Western Conference travel as part of the Canucks. All along, Vancouver had the huge recruiting advantage of having $10 million in cap space just sitting there.

The New York Times served up lots of analysis and links on this matter.

AROUND THE RINKS: Patrick Berglund’s bid for rookie-of-the-year honors got a boost with the demise of Blue Jackets center Derick Brassard, who could miss a month after suffering a shoulder injury. He led all rookie scorers with 25 points when he went down. Columbus can scarcely afford to lose that offense . . . Blue Jackets goaltender Fredrik Norrena is off to play in Russia. He cleared waivers after rookie Steve Mason took his job and opted to flee North America . . . Alexander Semin re-injured his back against the Blues, courtesy of a David Backes cross-check. He missed was with the original injury and was leading the NHL with 27 points when he was originally hurt. Some fantasy hockey general managers are unhappy with Backes today . . . The Stars have put 900-year-old defenseman Sergei Zubov down for the season. He underwent another hip operation and you wonder if his career is over. Hence the Dallas interest in Rosival . . . The turmoil continues in Tampa Bay, where Jussi Jokinen hit the waiver wire . . . The reeling Stars are getting a lift from Loui Eriksson, who scored his 15th, 16th and 17th goals of the season in a shootout victory over the Blue Jackets. By the way, the Blue Jackets are none to happy with the officiating in that game. Good stuff.