One's Finnish-ed And Another Hoping For A Strong Finnish!

TSN - Wtih the trade deadline come and passed Minnesota Wild's new GM Sean Curry made a few moves to improve his team for the future. 

First trade of the day saw veteran star goaltender Mikka Kiprusoff being shipped off to New Jersey in exchange for highly touted prospect Ryan Spooner, a 1st and 3rd round pick in this years draft.

Sean Curry is quoted as saying, "I would like to thank Mikka for his tenure here in Minnesota and wish him nothing but the best in New Jersey's quest for the championship." Asked what he thought of the return;  "I thought this was a great move for the hockey team and the future moving forward. Ryan Spooner has been a prospect that I have been keeping my eye on for a few years now and since we didn't have a first round pick in this years draft, it addressed a couple of needs on my checklist. The third rounder was icing on the cake."

The next move of the day saw disgruntled forward Wojtek Wolski on the move to Tampa Bay for young power forward Anthony Stewart, Wolski had been playing down in Houston for Minnesota's farm team where he had been unhappy with the demotion all season. "This was a straight up hockey move. I had a talk with Wojtek when I joined the team and told him I would try my best to have him moved to a better opportunity for him to get another chance to play up in the MRFHL. As for Anthony Stewart he's still young and has a lot of upside still in his game. I firmly believe that he can be a 30 goal scorer in this league and become a dominate power forward to boot." 

In a deal that came down to the wire before trade gates were closed, Minnesota acquired their new starting goaltender Antti Niemi from the Columbus Blue Jackets. "This deal took awhile to iron out the players going each way as Blue Jackets GM Jerry was playing hard ball. When the dust settled Niemi was coming to his new home and two prospects with Colorado's 3rd in this years draft going the other way. I'm sad to see Tyler Cuma leave but with the earlier acquistion of Ryan Spooner it was an easy move to make. Antti is going to be our starting goalie for the near future and we will begin contract negotiations with his agent immediately once he's settled into his new home here in Minni."

Asked if he was disappointed by not being able to make any other moves; "I am very happy with what I was able to do with these three deals. I think they will all help us move forward to a bright future. Of course I would have loved to make a couple more moves but the asking price this year was too high for the players I was looking at and I wasn't being offered anything solid in return for the players everyone was asking about. I'm excited to see what this team is made of here in the final weeks of the regular season as we push to regain something and maybe even make a push for the playoffs."

Media outlets from around the league are saying that they were impressed by these three moves and are interested to see what Sean Curry does next this off-season with so many expiring UFA's. He will have a great opportunity to give his team an instant facelift via free agency and the draft.

Ray Ferraro, Vancouver - TSN