The Minnesota Twins have not won a series yet this season.

They have an opportunity to do so in front of their home fans on Sunday afternoon in Minneapolis.

The Twins will square off against the Tampa Bay Rays in the rubber match of a three-game set. Minnesota won the series opener 10-4 on Friday night before Tampa Bay responded with a 7-1 victory on Saturday evening.

Twins manager Derek Shelton acknowledged that a lineup overrepresented with left-handed hitters made it harder to be flexible with certain pitching matchups.

“The fact we’re a little left-handed heavy may be something we have to look at as we get farther down the road,” Shelton said.

The series finale should give the Twins a chance to showcase their left-handed hitters.

The Rays will start right-hander Nick Martinez (0-0, 3.00 ERA). He also is making his second start after allowing two runs on six hits in six innings against the Milwaukee Brewers on Monday.

Martinez, 35, has faced the Twins seven times, including six starts. He is 1-2 with a 7.20 ERA in those matchups, and he has allowed 24 earned runs on 43 hits in 30 innings.

Rays manager Kevin Cash observed Martinez this spring and recognized that he is a complete teammate.

“He’s available, and he initiates conversation,” Cash said. “He initiates support. He’s actively having conversations with position players and pitchers alike. It’s easy to talk to your buddies about pitching, but I’m watching him interact with our position group.”

The Twins will counter with right-hander Simeon Woods Richardson (0-1, 3.60), who will make his second start of the season. He allowed two runs on five hits in five innings in his 2026 debut against the Kansas City Royals on Monday.

Woods Richardson has faced the Rays two times in his career. He is 0-0 with a 4.66 ERA in those outings, and he has walked four and struck out eight in 9 2/3 innings.

Byron Buxton was out of the lineup Saturday after being hit on the right forearm in Friday’s series opener. Buxton sustained a bruised arm and X-rays were negative.

If Buxton returns to the lineup, he will look to break out of an early-season slump. He is hitting .154 (4-for-26) with no homers and one RBI in his first seven games.

Twins infielder Luke Keaschall said he and his teammates will need to show more strike-zone discipline in the season finale.

“We didn’t get a lot of hittable pitches, and we probably left the zone a little bit too much,” Keaschall said.

Meanwhile, Chandler Simpson continues to swing a hot bat for the Rays. He went 2-for-5 on Saturday and is hitting .414 this season with a .469 on-base percentage.

Cash has been fielding questions about potentially promoting Simpson to the Rays’ leadoff position.

“There is a lot of conversation about Chandler,” he said. “I totally appreciate and understand the thought, the sentiment, that Chandler could be your prototypical leadoff hitter.

“He very well may be. But right now, he’s not.”

–Field Level Media

The Pittsburgh Penguins will look to make it back-to-back victories over the visiting Florida Panthers and sweep the season series on Sunday afternoon.

The Penguins (39-22-16, 94 points) topped the visiting Panthers 9-4 on Saturday night for their third win in the last four games.

With the victory, Pittsburgh resides 10 points back of the first-place Carolina Hurricanes in the Metropolitan Division and five points up on the third-place New York Islanders.

Evgeni Malkin (three goals, one assist) and defenseman Erik Karlsson (one goal, three assists) each recorded four-point performances for the Penguins. Ricard Rakell, Anthony Mantha and Elmer Soderblom each had a goal and an assist.

Noel Acciari and defenseman Ryan Shea also tallied while Arturs Silovs made 19 saves for the win.

Malkin became the 23rd player in NHL history to reach 1,400 points (1,403). He is the third active player to reach the milestone, joining teammate Sidney Crosby (1,756) and Washington Capitals superstar Alex Ovechkin (1,682).

“It’s an amazing number, for sure,” Malkin said. “For one team, it’s huge. I love playing here. … We have a great team right now. We played hard. Points are important, two points for the team are important because it’s huge for us. We’re fighting for the playoffs.”

Crosby had two assists in the win on Saturday to pass Hall of Famer Steve Yzerman (1,755) for the seventh-most points in NHL history.

“It feels like every couple of games these guys hit another milestone,” Penguins coach Dan Muse said. “It’s not like these minor milestones. These are big ones; these are some that you never really even get to see. It’s incredible.”

The Panthers (37-36-3, 76 points), who are officially eliminated from playoff contention, enter Sunday’s rematch with the Penguins looking to avoid back-to-back losses and win for just the third time in seven games.

“Obviously, we’re playing the exact same team, so clean things up that we need to and get another crack at them tomorrow,” Panthers forward Cole Schwindt said.

A.J. Greer collected a goal and an assist and defenseman Seth Jones, Noah Gregor and Mackie Samoskevich also tallied for the Panthers, who are 16-21-0 on the road.

“It was kind of a barrage of goals,” Jones said. “We did a good job coming back and making it 2-2 after a slow start, but then you blink, and it’s 9-2. We just couldn’t stop the bleeding. They did a good around the net.”

Sergei Bobrovsky allowed six goals on 19 shots before being replaced by Daniil Tarasov midway through the second. Tarasov stopped nine shots in relief.

“It got away from us,” Panthers coach Paul Maurice said. “I mean, just the quickness of the game, for us, was a lot. The puck movement. So, we had touches on almost all of the pucks that ended up in our net. … We were slower than they were. Credit them, they were fast.”

Florida dropped a 5-3 decision in Pittsburgh on Oct. 23.

The Panthers last beat the Penguins 4-3 in a shootout on March 23, 2025. Florida won two of three meetings between the clubs last season.

–Field Level Media

The Boston Bruins and Philadelphia Flyers are experiencing the Eastern Conference wild-card race from very different perspectives.

In either case, both teams are hungry for a win Sunday afternoon when the Bruins visit the Flyers in a late-season clash.

Boston (43-26-8, 94 points) currently sits atop the East wild-card standings with five games remaining. There is a four-way tie for the second and final wild-card spot that includes Philadelphia (38-26-12, 88 points), with all four teams having five or six games to play.

“It’s awesome. It’s the best time of the year, just trying to make the playoffs and just the playoff push,” Flyers rookie Alex Bump said. “It’s the best time of the year. It’s fun hockey. It’s kind of the situation you want to be in.”

Bump was in a good mood Friday after Philadelphia notched a 4-1 road victory over the New York Islanders, who sit one point ahead of the Flyers for third place in the Metropolitan Division. The top three teams in each division earn automatic playoff spots.

Bump joined defenseman Travis Sanheim with a goal and an assist against the Islanders, while Matvei Michkov had one and two, respectively. The Flyers had lost their previous two games — both against wild-card contenders — and desperately needed a crisp performance on Long Island.

“Obviously, a lot of resilience from our team,” Philadelphia coach Rick Tocchet said. “(We’ve played) three in four, four in six. I just love the energy, especially early. It’s a tough building to come into and they had a couple of days’ rest. … Everyone contributed tonight.”

Dan Vladar made 21 saves as the Flyers avoided their first three-game losing streak since late January.

“The guys played an unbelievable game today,” Vladar said.

The Flyers have a day of rest heading into Sunday’s affair, while the Bruins are facing a challenging back-to-back after losing 3-1 at Tampa Bay on Saturday. The Bruins led 1-0 in the third period before the Lightning scored three times to drop Boston to 0-2-0 on its four-game road trip.

“We played a pretty good game. We really did,” Boston coach Marco Sturm said.

Casey Mittelstadt scored the only goal for the Bruins, while Jeremy Swayman made 20 saves on 22 shots.

“I thought we had a lot of positives for our group. Sometimes you don’t get the results,” said Swayman, who has allowed three goals or fewer in each of his last nine starts. “Our team shouldn’t be hanging their heads. A lot of great things came out of tonight’s game and that’s what we should be focused on.”

The Bruins have one of the top-10 power-play units in the NHL but went 0-for-4 with the man advantage against Tampa Bay. They also failed to score with the extra skater (0-for-2) in Thursday’s 2-1 loss to the Florida Panthers.

“We had a few chances, even in the first, but I also thought the power play needed to step up,” Sturm said. “It didn’t really give us a whole lot of Grade-A chances. We were fine, though. We were still good enough today. But those little details, they matter, and those details have been hurting us for two games in a row.”

This is the third and final meeting this season between Philadelphia and Boston. The Bruins defeated the Flyers 6-3 on Jan. 29 before Philadelphia returned the favor with a 3-1 home victory on Feb. 28.

–Field Level Media