With injuries increasingly becoming a factor in the Minnesota Twins’ season, their manager talked of the need for versatility before they took the field to face the Brewers on Friday. Then a versatile lineup provided early offense and got solid pitching to win a 12th consecutive game.

Playing without standouts Carlos Correa and Byron Buxton, the Twins scored three runs in the first two innings and right-hander Joe Ryan held down the Brewers in a 3-0 win in the opener of a three-game series. Ryan improved to 4-2 with a six-inning shutout effort, surrendering just a pair of hits to the offensively-challenged Brewers.

It’s the second straight year Minnesota has had a 12-game winning streak, which is the longest streak in the majors this season. The franchise record is 15 straight, accomplished in 1991.

With dark skies and lightning flashing outside American Family Field’s closed roof, the Twins created some thunder in the opening half-inning. Minnesota took an early lead after leadoff man Trevor Larnach was hit by the second pitch of the game. He went to third on a single by Ryan Jeffers and scored on a RBI single to right by Ty France.

Adding to the injury woes, the next batter, Willi Castro, fouled a ball hard off his right knee and crumpled to the ground in pain. He finished the at-bat with a strikeout. Kody Clemens doubled the visitors’ lead with a RBI single to center that scored Jeffers from second.

Ryan needed 30 pitches to escape the first inning without giving up a run, allowing a leadoff single to Brice Turang, but getting back to the dugout after Sal Frelick sent a two-out fastball to the warning track in right, where Larnach tracked it down.

When Brewers starter Chad Patrick gave up three consecutive singles to start the second, it drew a mound visit to try and calm the rookie righty. He got Jeffers to ground into a 5-3 double play, but a run scored to give Minnesota 3-0 lead.

Castro played left field in the first inning, then left the game due, officially, to a knee contusion, with Clemens moving to the outfield and Ryan Fitzgerald entering the game at second base. It was the major league debut for the 30-year-old utility man. He flew out to center in his first two big league at-bats.

Ryan settled into a nice groove on the mound, striking out the side in the second and third, before hitting Brewers leadoff man Christian Yelich with a pitch that ran inside to start the fourth. Ryan cruised through the first two turns of the Milwaukee batting order, allowing just one hit and retiring 13 of 14 batters. Brewers catcher William Contreras dropped a double at the base of the wall with one out in the sixth, but Ryan got a groundout and a strikeout to elude damage.

Minnesota touched Patrick for eight hits over six innings before the Brewers’ bullpen took over. Patrick fell to 2-4 with the loss. The Twins got an inning each from Brock Stewart, Griffin Jax and Cole Sands to preserve the shutout. Sands got the save, striking out the last two Brewers.

Correa was placed on the seven-day injured list earlier in the day on Friday, while Buxton is still being evaluated by the team for a potential concussion after he collided with Correa in Thursday’s win at Baltimore.

Game 2 of the Rivalry Series weekend is Saturday at 6:15 p.m. CDT, with Twins right-hander Pablo Lopez facing Milwaukee’s Tobias Myers.

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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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