Closed-circuit to the men at Xcel Energy Center wearing iron range red, forest green, Minnesota wheat and harvest gold…

“Who are you and what have you done with our favorite offensively-challenged hockey team?”

With 6 goals v. Phoenix on Tuesday, and 5 goals tonite v. Edmonton, I hope these impostors can keep the real Wild players captive for a while longer. A Pierre-Marc Bouchard and Andrew Brunette that shoot the puck? An Antti Miettinen that makes moves and gets scoring opportunities? A physical Marek Zidlicky and a fighting (sorta) James Sheppard? Let me get the more rope to keep them tied up.

Tonite had to be one of the best games the Wizzy have played all season-long. This group was energized and flying around the ice from the opening faceoff. They had a jump I haven’t seen for a long time. They played tough and capitalized on turnovers.

Add to that 2 pretty pretty goals, one by Krystofer Kolanos set up by a great one-on-one move by pretend Miettinen, and the other by Brent Burns after Mikko Koivu ducked around 2 Oiler defensemen. I suppose it is possible the Oil may have just been bad on this nite, but you still need to execute, and these unknown men in Wild uniforms certainly did.

Next up is Hockey Day Minnesota!