ARLINGTON, Texas (AP) — Napheesa Collier scored 34 points, spoiling the WNBA debut of fellow UConn alum Paige Bueckers and leading the Minnesota Lynx to a 99-84 victory over the Dallas Wings in the season opener for both teams Friday night.

Bueckers scored the first points of the season for the Wings, and the No. 1 overall pick in this year’s draft finished with 10 in front of announced sellout at the 7,000-seat arena on the campus of Texas-Arlington.

Collier started a 13-1 run midway through the third quarter with a bucket in close and finished it with a free throw for a 71-58 lead for the Lynx, who lost to the New York Liberty in the WNBA Finals last year.

Courtney Williams had 25 points and nine assists and Jessica Shepard had 15 points and eight rebounds for Minnesota.

All-Star guard Arike Ogunbowale led Dallas with 16 points. DiJonai Carrington, acquired from the Connecticut Sun in an offseason trade as part of a roster overhaul after the Wings missed the playoffs in 2024, added 15 points.

Bueckers opened the scoring when she drove the lane after a nifty crossover move, missed the runner, grabbed the rebound and hit the putback. Her first assist came on a 3-pointer by Carrington that put Dallas up 51-50 in the second half.

A foul-filled first half included one on Bueckers when she got stuck playing post defense against Collier. Before Collier made both free throws after a timeout, she and Bueckers had a friendly chat at the line.

The teams combined for 30 free throws before halftime, when the game was tied at 46 after Ogunbowale made two free throws with four seconds left and Carrington stole the inbound pass before feeding Maddy Siegrist for a layup with 1.2 seconds remaining.

Bueckers missed both of her 3-point attempts and was 3 of 10 shooting with seven rebounds and two assists.

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The Minnesota House was poised to pass its education budget bill on Friday night after a debate over preserving unemployment benefits for hourly school workers derailed progress on the biggest chunk of state general fund spending earlier this month.

Democratic-Farmer-Labor and Republican House lawmakers late last month reached a compromise on spending that would have eliminated unemployment benefits for employees like bus drivers, cafeteria workers and paraprofessionals in 2028.

But the House DFL pulled back amid pressure from labor groups and the DFL’s progressive wing. Now it appears that the push to kill that benefit will die off when the education bill goes to conference committee with the Minnesota Senate version, which preserves the benefit.

DFLers expanded the unemployment benefit when they controlled state government in 2023, arguing it was unfair to exclude some school staff from unemployment insurance. Though some school districts said the mandate to continue offering it will strain their budgets when state funding dried up.

Education spending to remain level

Now that there’s a broader budget agreement between DFL Gov. Tim Walz, Senate DFL majority and the 67-67 tied House, it appears House Republicans have agreed to drop the rollback proposal. Under the deal, the state will have a two-year budget around $66 billion to $67 billion. It aims to control spending growth in social services and education.

The education budget makes up around one-third of the current $71 billion two-year state budget. Under the deal education spending will remain level for the next two years other than the required inflation-tied increases.

The House’s proposal still includes the rollback of unemployment insurance, but when they hammer out differences with the DFL majority Senate’s education bill, they’ll remove that piece, House DFL leader Melissa Hortman said Thursday.

House and Senate pre-kindergarten through 12th-grade education spending proposals have differences. For instance, the House calls for a $40 million increase in spending in 2026-2027, whereas the Senate currently keeps it level.

Under the budget deal, state leaders plan to cut spending by $420 million in 2028-2029 to help address a looming multi-billion state deficit in those years. But spending will remain level in the budget for 2026-2027.

In addition to the education budget, members of the House also were expected to take up a separate bill to provide the hourly school worker unemployment benefit with $100 million to operate over the next two years. About $77 million in funding would come from money originally meant for the Minneapolis-Duluth Northern Lights Express passenger rail project. The rest would come from state special education aid.

Flashpoints in negotiations

Unemployment insurance for hourly workers is not a significant portion of the state’s multibillion-dollar education budget. The 2023 bill provided around $135 million to cover the program for four years, though the state has already burned through most of that money at this point.

Despite it not being a huge portion of the budget, it emerged as flashpoint in negotiations on one of the biggest pieces of state spending. Controversy is now shifting to a proposal to cut state funded health insurance benefits for adults in the country illegally and to shut down the state prison in Stillwater.

The insurance issue sparked protests from DFLers Thursday outside the governor’s reception room at the Capitol and may pose a threat to efforts to finalize the budget. The regular session ends on May 19, and lawmakers have to pass a two-year budget by the end of June 30 or the state government shuts down.

In the last decade, there has been a special session every time control of government is split between the parties. Legislative leaders agree it’s likely they’ll have to return to the Capitol this year to finish the budget.

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Jaden McDaniels was asked how it felt to dispatch the Warriors in five games in the Western Conference semifinals on Wednesday.

Straight faced, the wing replied, “it felt like the rest of them.”

That was the Timberwolves’ fourth playoff series victory over the last 13 months. They have become old hat, by now. Plus, there was nothing remarkable about the series win over the Warriors. Minnesota caught an unwanted break with Steph Curry going down with a hamstring injury in Game 1, and took full advantage by winning the next four games in dominant fashion.

“Just a business-like approach. Really liked that,” Timberwolves coach Chris Finch said. “We were the better team. We felt we were the better team. We just had to go out and play like it every night. I thought we’d accomplish that. Those are things that we’ve drawn upon from our previous experiences, for sure.”

Now, onward.

This stage — the Western Conference finals, which will open with Game 1 on Tuesday in Oklahoma City or Denver — is the one on which Minnesota saw its season end at the hands of Dallas a year ago. Finch and the coaching staff have challenged players to recount their feelings after that defeat, being denied on the doorstep of the NBA Finals, and recall what they need to do differently.

“Try to tap into that now, individually, to put themselves in the right frame of mind for what it’s going to take to keep taking these steps,” Finch said.

While getting back to the conference finals in consecutive seasons for the first time in franchise history is a feat, it was never Minnesota’s goal.

“It’s to make it to the finals,” McDaniels said. “I feel like it’ll feel different if we advance to the finals. … I think we’re super confident. We’re all together, being a good team, and we just ready for whoever we play next already. We just got to stay the course.”

Anthony Edwards said “there is no satisfaction” in where Minnesota is at the moment, noting the Wolves “haven’t did anything yet.” Minnesota seemed to feel a sense of relief and accomplishment after its wild Game 7 win over Denver a year ago. Perhaps that made it difficult to reset for the West finals just a couple days later.

Now, Minnesota is armed with time — there are six days between Game 5 against the Warriors and Game 1 of the conference finals — and experience. Plus, the result against Golden State was so expected after Curry went down, that there was no real emotional high from which to come down.

“It feels good to get to that step, but the stomach is not full. Not at all. It’s just one step,” Rudy Gobert said. “Last year, it felt different because it was a Game 7, and we were down I don’t know how many at half, and we came back and won. Obviously, the adrenaline was different but this year it’s kind of like, we say it, we sat down early in the season, we say we’re going to get back right where we left last year. We want to achieve our goal. Now, we are halfway there. We know it’s not going to get easier at all. We focus on that.”

Gobert noted that, in his mind, last year’s West finals came down to approach.

“It’s not about talent. It’s not about us wanting to win or not. We want to win. But, it’s about staying level-headed,” he said. “After a win like we had last year against Denver in Game 7, I felt like you get the whole world praising you. All the sudden, you went from being the underdog to being the favorite. We weren’t mature enough to handle that yet. We were aware of it. This year, we’re mature enough. I feel like we understand where we’re at. That’s the lesson. It’s about us and our approach. It’s not about who we face. It’s about mindset, our work our attention to details. When our level of urgency is right, we know we can play with anyone.”

Keep the focus on the task at hand, until there’s truly a reason to party.

There’s really nothing to celebrate yet,” McDaniels said. “We still got two more rounds, winning eight more games, I want to say, so you just got to stay confident, keep being humble and just be ready to play.”

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An abandoned 54-foot cruiser boat beached on Beer Can Island in the St. Croix River in Hudson has been towed away after the owner racked up more than $40,000 in fines from the city.

Calling it an “eyesore,” Dave Jarvis, of St. Croix River Cruises in Hudson, worked with three other men to get the boat, the Sweet Destiny, towed off the island on Friday.

“We were all kind of sick of looking at it,” he said. “If we didn’t do it, who would’ve done it?”

The city, Jarvis said, had been looking into possible funding to have the boat removed, but it might have been an even longer wait. So Jarvis called the city and asked permission to tow the boat.

“They didn’t hire us,” Jarvis said of the city. “We just did it.”

As of December, the owner of the boat had racked up more than $44,000 in fines, according to Police Chief Geoff Willems. It is unclear how much the owner, Grayson McNew, owes now.

He did not return emails for comment on Friday night.

A crew of four spent all day Friday removing the beached boat.

Jarvis and his father, Gordy, worked with Wayne Prokosch and Josh Stokes from River City Welding in Red Wing, beginning at 8 a.m. and finishing up with the boat settled in for the night at Jarvis’s dock at 5 p.m.

Getting the boat off the island was the “right thing to do,” Jarvis said. “Let me put it this way, it’s been a sour topic in our community for quite some time and honestly, an eyesore. Everybody has been wanting that boat off of there. There are safety issues and environmental hazards. It was time. It was time for somebody to do something and we have the knowledge, ability and experience.”

Jarvis said the boat will be towed to Red Wing on Monday where it is possible someone might buy it for next to nothing.

“It might be scrapped or refurbished. It is really a wreck. Everything would have to be replaced,” Jarvis said, noting the boat would need a lot of work including a new engine and electrical system.

McNew apparently bought the 1981 Bluewater Intercoastal in 2024. The boat, which was beached on the sand, apparently had a hole in its hull and sank halfway, Willems said. It also had its rudder ripped off, he said.

“He thought he got a good deal and that he could fix it up and do something with it,” Willems said. “Then life happened, and he didn’t have the money or time to fix it up.”

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In August 2024, Hudson officials contacted McNew, of Afton, and told him he had until Oct. 1 to remove the boat or he would be charged for the removal and towing of the boat. McNew “stated he understood,” according to police reports.

But the boat remained marooned on the island until Friday.

McNew, who has twice run unsuccessfully for the Minnesota House, first came to the attention of Hudson officials in July when he docked the cruiser at the city’s new boat launch in Lakefront Park, Willems said.

“It was parked there for, like, a week, and we started getting complaints about it,” Willems said. “So we called him and said, ‘Hey, the boat’s got to move.’ He moved it out to (Beer Can) Island and then just left it there.”