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SAINT PAUL Connor Williams Jersey , Minn. — It’s widely known in the hockey world that the game gets much more difficult in the playoffs. With the Minnesota Wild on the verge of clinching their sixth consecutive trip to the postseason, their life just got much tougher.

As they prep for their regular-season home finale on Monday against the Edmonton Oilers, the Wild are having to rapidly adjust to life without both of their top defensemen.

They’d already lost Jared Spurgeon with a groin injury a few weeks ago, and now the word out of Minnesota is that Ryan Suter is out with a fractured fibula, suffered in Saturday night’s 4-1 loss to the Stars in Dallas.

Suter, who has been the team’s mainstay on the blue line since coming to Minnesota as a free agent in the summer of 2012, has been averaging nearly 27 minutes of ice time per game and shouldering an increased load with Spurgeon missing in recent weeks. He went hard into the boards during the loss in Dallas and did not return to the ice.

“That’s a tough one for us. I don’t think I need to explain. We all understand how important he is for our team,” Wild left winger Zach Parise said. “You don’t like to see your teammates or anybody go down like that.”

On Easter Sunday, the Wild made it clear that they expect to have a hole to fill on defense, recalling rookie blue-liner Carson Soucy from their Iowa AHL team. He is expected to make his NHL debut versus the Oilers.

Minnesota sits third in the Central Division with four games to play Ronald Jones II Youth Jersey , and according to one numbers-crunching website, has a better than 98 percent chance of making the playoffs. The Wild are widely expected to open the postseason on the road against the Winnipeg Jets, who have clinched second place in the Central.

The Oilers have three games remaining and come to Minnesota for their final road game of the season having lost four in a row, including a 3-2 decision to the Flames on Saturday night in Calgary.

After a slow start, the Oilers put up a fight against their provincial rivals but came up short in what has become the storyline in an overall disappointing season.

“We decided to play harder and compete a little bit more after the first (period). We can’t complain about the effort or the opportunities we created,” Oilers coach Todd McLellan said. “Numerous two-on-ones and three-on-twos where it’s on the offensive player’s sticks and they’re not going in.

“The other thing that comes into play once again for our team is the power play. We had five opportunities to at least get one to pull us back in it and we never did.”

The Oilers will be looking to sweep the season series with the Wild. Edmonton won 3-2 in Minnesota in December and 4-1 when the teams met in March in Edmonton.

锟斤拷 Gerald Green was at a crossroads.

Released by Milwaukee in training camp, the career journeyman couldn’t find another NBA team that wanted him.

He contemplated playing internationally and in the G League, but no one had any use for the over-30 player with almost a decade of NBA experience.

“I was honestly contemplating retirement,” he told The Associated Press. “A lot of people don’t know that, but I was done.”

So he contacted his agent to put an expiration date on his basketball career.

“I was like: ‘Look man Will Hernandez Jersey , when Jan. 1, 2018, hits, if I’m unsigned, I’m putting out a big statement on my Instagram letting everybody know, thank you for the awesome career over all these years but I’m done,'” he said. “‘I ain’t going to play no more.'”

Just four days shy of his self-imposed deadline, Green received the call that would change everything: His hometown Houston Rockets wanted him.

“Basketball was the last thing on my mind until I got that call,” he said. “Then it’s kind of like … ‘Are you serious?'”

By then, the 32-year Green had already “mentally checked out” of basketball. He was spending his days doing work in real estate and teaming with rapper Trae Tha Truth to help victims of Hurricane Harvey.

The Rockets took a chance on Green Tremaine Edmunds Bills Jersey , and now he could make it pay off.

Green’s years as an underdog – along with his length and athleticism – could be just what Houston needs Wednesday night when the Rockets try to even up the Western Conference finals after losing Game 1 to the Golden State Warriors.

He knew when he joined the Rockets it was a shot at redemption – on many levels.

He was traded to Houston as a 22-year-old in 2008 but released a little more than two weeks later after appearing in just one game.

When Green came to the Rockets the first time, he acknowledges he had the wrong attitude. The young man who’d had a modest upbringing on the South side of Houston had money after being drafted in the first round in 2005, and was coming off a memorable performance in the dunk contest at the 2008 All-Star Game where he blew out a candle atop a cupcake that was balanced on the back of the rim before throwing down a two-handed slam.

“It was right place at the wrong time,” he said of his mini-stint with the Rockets. “I just wasn’t focused. I still wanted to go out and enjoy my success of getting to the NBA instead of me trying to enjoy the work process of getting better.”

In the years since, he bounced around with six other NBA teams and spent two years playing in Russia and China. When he returned to Houston, he knew from the first day that his second stint was going to be special.

“As soon as I walked in the door I felt like everybody had their arms open to me like: ‘We need a hug. Come on, man. We’ve been waiting on you,'” he said mimicking a hug with his long muscular arms.

And the feeling was certainly mutual.

“To know him is to love him,” Chris Paul said. “He’s one of those people that if you don’t like Gerald Green, you’re telling me a lot about yourself.”

It was a new feeling for Green Lamar Jackson Ravens Jersey , who said he felt like some of his previous teammates wondered why he was on the team and never fully embraced him.

“I get judged a lot,” he said. “Maybe because of the way I talk, the way I look, I’m real quick to say a lot of stuff that maybe people don’t understand because that’s just me. I’m not the type of person that’s scripted … but on this team since Day 1, I could say something (crazy) and they ain’t never judged me for that.”

Coach Mike D’Antoni had known of the lanky forward with a knack for 3-pointers for years, but wasn’t sure what to expect when Houston signed him off the street.

He didn’t have to wait long. The day after he signed he scored 18 points, and in his fourth game and Houston’s first of the season without James Harden, who was nursing a hamstring injury, Green put on a show. He scored 27 points and made 7 of 10 3-pointers to help the Rockets to a win over Orlando. The next night he outdid himself, tying a career high with eight 3s and finishing with 29 points as Houston fell to Golden State.

Green Cheap Ronald Jones II Jersey , who played high school basketball in Houston, averaged more than 18 points in the seven games Harden was out.

He has continued to bring a spark off the bench, averaging 12.1 points in the regular season – his highest average since 2015. He credits his turnaround to the nurturing environment fostered by D’Antoni, who he calls a “confidence-giver.”

And despite his limited work, he’s become a fan favorite for his almost obsessive love for Houston.

Green arrives to almost every game in a jersey of one of Houston’s teams, and he has three tattoos that pay homage to the city. Running down the entire length of his left forearm is the word “Houston” in graffiti-style block letters. On the front of his left shoulder is ink replicating the sign for Interstate 45, a freeway that runs directly by where he was raised. The last one is a nod to the Houston Oilers, a baby blue oil derrick on the back of the same shoulder almost identical to the ones that once adorned their helmets.

But his representation of Houston doesn’t stop there. Each time he hits a 3-pointer, he contorts both of his hands into “H’s” and holds them high toward the crowd.

Says Harden: “He’s the most Houston person I.
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