Bruno's dog to do "Let's Play Hockey" tonight; Aeros to play at Xcel on Sunday

Update: Niklas Backstrom vs. Craig Anderson tonight. No Peter Forsberg. He's not even in town as he continues to try to get his work visa approved.

In other local news, former Minnetonka Skipper Jake Gardiner's rights were dealt to Toronto by Anaheim along with Joffrey Lupul and a fourth-rounder in 2013 for Francois Beauchemin, who won a Cup with the Ducks in 2007.

Gardiner, having a big year with the Badgers, was originally drafted by Leafs GM Brian Burke in Anaheim. This should be a great move for Gardiner. Burke loves the guy and the Ducks have a bunch of up-and-coming young puck-moving blue-liners, like Cam Fowler and Luca Sbisa. On one of my radio shows recently, we talked about how Gardiner would be best served if he was on the move soon.

On any significant move between now and the deadline, I've got to think most will be East-West trades. No West team's going to watch to help out their brethren and potentially hurt themselves.

In other news, Alex Tanguay has a concussion in Calgary, which could potentially hurt the upswing Flames long-term. Plus, he was potential trade bait for teams like Pittsburgh.

Morning. I'll update blog later if there's news from the Wild and Avs morning skates.

The Wild and NHL will honor Andrew Brunette tonight before the game for playing his 1,000th of his regular-season career Feb. 1. His parents, wife, brother and sister-in-law, friends and golden retriever, Simon, will be at the game.

Simon not only will be at the X, he'll take part in the festivities.

Simon, who's somewhere between age 5 and 7 (the Brunettes don't know because Lorie and Andrew rescued Simon when Andrew was playing in Denver), will do "Let's Play Hockey" tonight with Brunette's brother, 33-year-oldJamie. Simon is the second canine to ever do "Let's Play Hockey."

Outdoors journalist Ron Schara and his dog, Raven, once did LPH.

Jamie Brunette, incidentally, looks and laughs like Brunette, "which can't be a good thing," quipped Andrew.

A video tribute begins at 7:07 p.m. Afterward, Brunette will be showered with gifts from the Wild, his teammates and the NHL. The puck drop is 7:14 p.m. -- six minutes later than normal.

Justin Falk, Jed Ortmeyer, Cody Almond and Patrick O'Sullivan scored. Anton Khudobin made 32 saves. Patty O has been awesome down there and now has four goals in his last three games.

It's amazing what's going on down there. Mike Yeo's got to be a Coach of the Year candidate, and if there's an Executive of the Year award, how about Jim Mill?

If you want to catch the red-hot Aeros, they're bringing their act to Minnesota this weekend.

They play at Rockford tonight, in Peoria Friday, will bus to Minneapolis after the game, attend Saturday's Wild game vs. St. Louis and host Peoria at the X on Sunday at 1 p.m.

Tickets for that game can be purchased on Ticketmaster or the Xcel box office.