Wild prospects advance to Traverse City title game; Live #mnwild chat Wednesday on Startribune.com

(updated)

Good early evening from Minneapolis, where I'm gearing up for the 2010-11 season.

If you want to talk puck and ask questions about this upcoming Wild and NHL season, I'll be doing a live chat on startribune.com Wednesday at noon CT. So please join in.

Out east in beautiful Traverse City, the Wild rookies improved to 3-0 in the tournament with a group sweep of Carolina, Columbus and the Rangers. Tuesday's 5-4 win over New York included two goals from Jarod Palmer and one each from Casey Wellman, Joel Broda and Jay Fehr. New York's fourth goal came at the buzzer, said assistant GM Brent Flahr.

The championship is Wednesday at 5 p.m. against the Detroit Red Wings.

"Great effort," Flahr said in a text.

On the Wild's press release, Flahr said, "These guys played hard. They were blocking shots and doing all the little things needed to win. The Rangers had a good team and a number of good players, but we were able to shut down their bigger guys and just found a way to win."

Be a little more patient, and you'll have plenty of Wild stories in the paper daily.

Training camp opens Friday with physicals and fitness testing, as well as the media luncheon where the front office and coaching and scouting staffs are made available. Saturday begins the on-ice sessions, Sunday's scrimmage from 10-noon is free and open to the public and next Wednesday will be the preseason opener against St. Louis.

There are plenty of good tickets still available for every game this season, including the "North American" home opener against Edmonton.

Eric Belanger finally is off the market. Amazingly, he was forced to sign a one-year, $750,000 deal with Phoenix. Had to be a frustrating summer for the former Wild center. Also, former Wild defenseman Shane Hnidy is on a tryout with Phoenix.