From now on, I’m giving the locker-room speeches. I know how to fire the boys up.

Just a joke. This is a desperate hockey team, and they were coming out fired up regardless of what this hack throws into the paper, although I’ve gotten about three emails and three texts saying I should have been named first star. But that would have been way too egotistical of me, so I just gave it to Brent Burns.

He was OK tonight. Just scored the overtime winner, his fourth (tying Marian Gaborik’s team record), and assisted on both other goals in a stunning, unexpected win over maybe the best team in the NHL, the Stanley Cup-contending Sharks from NoCal.

I didn’t mention this morning, but I think it’ll be OK to mention now. Burnzie … not happy with yours truly, and it doesn’t even have to do with my column in today’s paper. It has to do with me writing he ducked out of the locker room after the Calgary game. See, I thought Burns only read Russo’s Rants, so I slipped it into the paper. My mistake. He reads the paper, too.

Burns opened and closed his press scrum with little subliminal “duck” messages to me, then jokingly told me, “I didn’t duck. I just dress fast. Today, I didn’t dress fast enough.”

Hopefully Burns is OK with me now. I have written a few glowing things about the kid in my day, although he did have this line in his postgame: “Hopefully we can realize that we are a great team in here. There’s a lot of stuff outside that we can’t control, but inside here we’ve got to believe that we’ve got a good team, and believe in each other.”

See, like Mike Keenan, I’m a master motivator.

Next: James Sheppard. Just awesome tonight. Funny story, but before the game, FSN analyst Kevin Gorg asked me whom I guaranteed would score tonight, and I said James Sheppard.

Gorg said, “If Sheppard scores, I’ll buy you dinner.”

I just had this feeling he’d be a little fired up, too. And he was good, and technically he did score, even though replays proved Krys Kolanos scored 24 seconds earlier (second goal of season for Kolanos against San Jose), wiping out Sheppard’s goal. (Although, I still think Kolanos’ shot banked off Sheppard. When asked after the game, Sheppard said, grinning, “No.”)

I don’t buy it. I think Gorg should at least buy me lunch, or soup, like Kenny Banya.

Funny stuff about the Wild scoring two goals on one power play. First, the same thing happened in Calgary. Like Kolanos, Stephane Veilleux hit the back bar. The puck went in and out so quick, the referee was fooled into thinking it hit the pipe.

In Calgary, the Flames were still assessed a penalty even after replays proved Veilleux scored and the clock was backed up. So Kolanos and Sheppard were jokingly trying to convince us after the game that the league should change the rule in these type of cases and allow both goals.

Jacques Lemaire was gold after the game. Go to WildTV and watch his presser just funny.

On Milan Michalek’s tying goal with 25.2 ticks left, Lemaire looked like a jack in the box behind his podium, saying, “I was like the fans, ‘Grrr,’” said Lemaire, sinking behind his podium. “And then I went back with them when we scored, ‘All right!’”

On Andrew Brunette’s waved-off goal because referee Stephane Auger lost sight of the puck and blew play dead even though replays showed Evgeni Nabokov never covered the puck, Lemaire was comical in a way only Lemaire can be. You’ve got to watch it.

He said, “Everyone crashes the net. How many goals we got against us by them crashing the net and we’re waiting for the whistle? This is what gets coaches upset. Now you get one after you tell your guys for two months that this is the game now – ‘You’ve got to go there’ — and then we finally get one, they blow, no goal.”

Then, sounding like Yoda, Lemaire said, “That’s why we get upset.”

On Owen Nolan’s first-period power-play goal snapped an 11-game streak in which the Wild surrendered the first goal, Lemaire said, “It was nice to get the lead … once … in our season.”

How about Nolan? No practices. Misses 10 games. Scores his 143rd power-play goal against the team he captained for five seasons. He’s second in Sharks history in goals, points and penalty minutes. The goal was the Wild’s first home power-play goal against San Jose since 2003.

Since his 2003 trade from the Sharks to Toronto, Nolan had faced his old team 12 prior times in the regular season. He had a hat trick last Jan. 30, and 11 no-goal games.

The win snapped an eight-game losing streak to San Jose. It was also the Wild’s first win over the West since Dec. 3 (snapping an 0-8-1 streak).

Burns’ winner was his 10th career in his 299th game. Burns was funny after. Normally in overtime, he rides Marian Gaborik’s coattails by stuffing home the garbage on Gaborik rebounds. But with no Gaborik, Burns had to find another way.

Speaking of Gaborik, read my story tomorrow. Two things: 1) I know Gaborik flew to Colorado in the last couple days to get his sore groins looked at. I don’t know 100 percent what was discovered, but I hear it wasn’t good. 2) Witnesses tell me Gaborik and Doug Risebrough had, what I described as an animated conversation near the Zamboni entrance before Sunday’s game. I don’t know the context because, not like they’d tell me anyway, but Gaborik and Risebrough weren’t talking to me — today, at least.

Couple things I had to chop out of my notebook:

Jacques Lemaire said this morning how much he’s looking forward to December being history. The Wild’s 3-9-1 heading into tonight.

I reminded him how this all started with a 6-5 loss to Colorado, a game in which all six defensemen were not good.

“That was a tough month. Oh boy. Didn’t expect that. You can get out of one game. You can play bad, the whole team, next game you bounce back. Never did. We never did.”

Also, Lemaire went on an unsolicited rant Wednesday morning, saying, “You’ve got 29 teams playing the same way, backing up each other on the ice and we’re not. There’s a problem. We’re lazy, we don’t want to do it?
“It’s not because we don’t ask. I was the first [coach] that asked [to play this style]. Now [every team] asks it, and I know I’m the only one that doesn’t get it.”
Lemaire continued, almost insinuating players believe they’re being held back, saying, “As a player, I can’t feel I’m hooked up. ‘I can’t play, I can’t produce or I can’t do this or I can’t play my game or I can’t get my goals or I can’t get my assists.’ There’s 29 teams playing [this style]. They’re getting their points.”

Happy New Year everyone, although the Wild actually practices at noontime at Parade, so I’ve got to work. Enjoy the holiday.�

This entry was posted on Wednesday, December 31st, 2008 at 4:32 pm and is filed under Game coverage. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.