Good evening from the Joe, where the undermanned Wild actually played well but still lost 4-2 to the Mighty Wings, heading to their 20th consecutive postseason.

Carson McMillan became the fourth Wild player to score a goal in his NHL debut late (Marian Gaborik, Pascal Dupuis and Rickard Wallin) and Brad Staubitz had his first career 2-point game with his third goal in eight games and an assist.

You can read the article that'll be on the site in a few hours and tomorrow's paper for all the details, but I'm pretty much done doing traditional gamers now. In Sunday's paper, I focused on Maxim Noreau, in Monday's on Carson McMillan and Colton Gillies and how it's important that the Wild get to a draft-and-develop path. That's how the Red Wings and all the good teams do it.

Pierre-Marc Bouchard has been selected as the Wild's nominee for the Bill Masterton trophy by the Twin Cities chapter of the Professional Hockey Writers' Association. The honor is given annually to the NHL player who best exemplifies the qualities of perseverance, sportsmanship and dedication to ice hockey.

Wild goalie Jose Theodore, while playing for Washington, won the award last season with former Wild defenseman Kurtis Foster, then with Tampa Bay, and current Wild minor-leaguer Jed Ortmeyer, then with San Jose, runners-up. After a debilitating concussion that made him wonder if he'd ever play hockey or feel normal again, Bouchard successfully achieved a comeback to the NHL on Dec. 1 after being limited to one game in 20-plus months. Now he's doing Spin-O-Rama's, dancing the blue line and scoring overtime winners and shootout goals again. He's scored 11 goals and 34 points in 55 games. "It feels almost like a second chance," Bouchard said last month. Also, Tom Reid's Hockey City Pub in St. Paul (two blocks west of the X on West 7th) will be hosting "Glen Sonmor Night" Monday Night from 6-8. The event is open to the public and several of the state's Who's Who in hockey will be on hand to honor Sonmor. The Wild has Monday off. Barring news, Kent will be with you on Tuesday. Right now McMillan and Colton Gillies, whom Richards was happy with, barring the health of John Madden and Martin Havlat. I'd think we may see at least one D change at some point because I know there's one guy in Houston the Wild would like to reward with a game before the season's up.