TIMBERWOLVES CLINCH IN OT THRILLER

Betts' OT shorty lifts Wolves in big win
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Budapest, Hungary- It took 66 games to notch their 40th win, but as of Friday the Timberwolves are officially playoff-bound. Doing so by dropping a team that sits directly above them in the overall CCHL standings in dramatic fashion.
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The game featured a goal-for-goal match up that ended in overtime when Blair Betts [pictured] jumped on an errant Honved pass while the Timberwolves were short-handed, and traded passes with TJ Oshie before taking a precise wrist shot on and past Budapest's Evgeny Nabokov for a 3-2 Thunder Bay victory.
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With the win, the Timberwolves still remain in 4th place overall with 88 points behind Budapest [also 88 points, but 41 wins] and #1 Copenhagen [96 points] and Dayton [91 points] with 16 games remaining.
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"Making the playoffs is great," said Timberwolves GM Blake Wendt. "It's something to check off the list of goals we made for this season. But we're not happy or content with just making the playoffs. We may be ahead of the curve in regards to where we thought we'd be in the remake of this hockey club, but we're here to win a championship now. So yes, getting to the playoffs is the first step in getting to that ultimate goal. But we cannot change anything. We cannot sit back and wait out these last sixteen games. We have to get better every game and jump into the postseason in full stride. I look forward to the ride."
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The Timberwolves will depart Budapest and travel back to Thunder Bay but will not play again until Tuesday when they welcome the Linz Black Wings to the Canadian National Gardens.
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>>>3-STARS
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>>>*Blair Betts [THU] - Game-winning short-handed goal in overtime
>>**Mike Knuble [BUD] - 1 goal and an assist
>***Mike Modano [BUD] - 1 goal