Russo here in Columbus, where the Wild is close to signing Darius Miles, according to sources.

Josh Harding gets the nod tonight because Niklas Backstrom’s not 100 percent. If he were, coach Jacques Lemaire said he’d play. But Backstrom practiced this morning, said he’s felt good all day, could have played and will be ready to play next week.

Kristian Huselius (concussion) back for the Jackets after just two skates. Steve Mason, who was scintillating last night in a shutout at Washington, gets back-to-back starts. Colton Gillies and Erik Reitz will be scratched for the Wild. Derek Boogaard (upper body) skated this morning and feels better.

Not much more to say really. I feel great. Felt like I’ve been scanned by Norton’s anti-virus. The bug was found and I’ve been patched up.

Here’s a funny story. So my alarm on my Blackberry this morning goes off.

I hop up all refreshed, turn on my laptop, do about 20 minutes of expenses, read some NHL stories, etc., etc. I grab my cell to text somebody to see if they wanted to get breakfast, and … it’s 5:35 a.m. I look at the clock on my laptop — 5:35 a.m. On my desk, 5:35 a.m.

Last night, I didn’t save the 8:30 wakeup on my cell, so it went off at 5 a.m. — my wakeup call from the night before to make my Philly to Columbus flight. It was fun getting back to sleep.

You would have all enjoyed watching me walk the couple miles to the rink this morning. It was literally a quarter-inch of ice the entire way there. I was bracing myself on newspaper stands, street signs, everything. Apparently, there’s no such thing as salt in Columbus. I almost wiped out in front of the Nationwide Insurance headquarters, so that would have been a fun claim.

Now you know why I write and don’t play. Can’t skate.

That’s it from here. The Gophers’ women’s hockey team is expected to attend tonight’s Wild game after their game against the Buckeyes.

This entry was posted on Saturday, January 10th, 2009 at 10:39 am and is filed under Pregame skate. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.