Russo here. I didn’t cover tonight’s excitement from the X, but I wanted to jump on because Kent had trouble getting into the blog.

Brent Burns will not travel with the Wild on Wednesday due to concussion-like symptoms. He’s been having recurring headaches and the Wild will shut him down for a few days.

How about tonight’s game? Two times in five days the Wild rallied on the Sharks from 3-0 down, but in the end, the only difference was the victor. Still a huge point as the Wild jumped to ninth in the West.

Huge goal by rookie Peter Olvecky. The other day, I was sitting and talking with an NHL scout for a long time over lunch. He was going on and on and on about how good Olvecky can be. He said he thought he’d be a star when he first came to North America, but he’s still convinced he can be a top-two line forward in this league. He said it’s important “the Wild doesn’t turn him into a checker.”

So typical that Youngblood covers one game all season, and this was the one. He always gets the crazy heart attack games on deadline (see Wild’s rally from 6-3 down to win in Nashville). Half of me wishes I covered the game; the other half found it more fun to watch on TV at a sports bar.

Also, here’s a little housekeeping: I leave for Denver in the morning and will be doing a live chat again on startribune.com Wednesday at 1 p.m. A link will be up at startribune.com some time in the morning. Please join in if it won’t get you in trouble at work.

Also, the Wild is not practicing Wednesday. Instead, the team will arrive in the late afternoon and work out in a Denver gym, so you might not get a blog Wednesday.

However, Russo Radio will be on KSTP, 1500 am back at the usual time of 6 p.m.

Incidentally, did you all see that Jason Spezza got nabbed for an illegal stick against Toronto Monday night? Remember, I guaranteed he was using an illegal stick last month at this link.

OK, I’ll chat with you Wednesday.

Couple stats courtesy of Wild from tonight:

RW Owen Nolan scored two goals to give him 20 this season, and 401 in his NHL career. He became the 15th active player to reach the 400-goal plateau. Nolan, who played parts of eight seasons with San Jose, has 841 points (401-440=841) in 1,111 NHL games. Nolan’s second goal left the New York Islanders as the lone NHL team this season without a 20-goal scorer.
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Minnesota fell to 0-13-2 this season when allowing four or more goals, and is 0-17-2 in that circumstance since a 5-4 win over Nashville on Feb. 17, 2008.
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LW Peter Olvecky scored his second goal this season – first in eight games since Feb. 22 against Chicago. Olvecky has four points (2-2=4) in 19 games in this, his rookie season.
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RW Pierre-Marc Bouchard scored his 16th goal of the season. Bouchard’s career-high for goals is 20, set in 2006-07. Bouchard is the Wild’s second leading scorer this season with 43 points (16-27=43). The Wild fell to 32-4-2 when Bouchard scores a goal, dating back to Dec. 23, 2006.
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D Kim Johnsson had an assist, giving him a four-game assist streak, with five helpers in that span. His career-high is five games, set twice, most recently from Oct. 12-22, 2002. Johnsson is also plus-six in the last four games.
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Rookie RW Cal Clutterbuck posted an assist for the second straight game and added a new franchise-record 10 hits, increasing his NHL-leading total to 272. The NHL record is 311, set last season by Los Angeles’Dustin Brown.
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Minnesota fell to 21-25-3 against the Western Conference this season. The Wild hasn’t had a losing record against the West since 2003-04. Tonight’s game marked the 11th of 15 straight against the West.
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Each of Minnesota’s last four games has been decided by one goal (2-1-1). The Wild fell to 17-10-6 in one-goal games this season.
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The Wild is 1-1-3 in its last five home games and is 18-12-5 at Xcel Energy Center this season. Minnesota went 25-11-5 at home in 2007-08, and 29-7-5 in 2006-07.

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