Champagne sprays, Twins hold sway ... for less than a day

MINNEAPOLIS -- They sprayed champagne. They looked at the clock.

They poured beer. They looked at the clock.

The Twins have tonight to celebrate the 'greatest game ever played in the United States ...' (Getty Images)

"Hey, we've gotta shut this down," Michael Cuddyer said as he walked through a Metrodome clubhouse that looked like October 1987 and October 1991 all over again. "We've gotta go ... Nah!''

They had to go, eventually, these unbelievable Twins. They had to go because as much as this looked like those other celebrations, those World Series celebrations, the baseball season isn't over yet. The playoff season isn't over.

Heck, according to the official rules of baseball, the playoff season hasn't even begun. Unofficially, we're here to tell you that we just saw one of the most unbelievable playoff games ever played.

"That's the greatest game ever, and I don't care what anyone says," Twins outfielder Denard Span said. "That's the greatest game ever played in the United States of America, or in Japan, or anywhere."

It ended at 9:45 p.m. ET, and we tell you the exact time only so you can remember it when you watch the first pitch at Yankee Stadium just after 6 p.m. Wednesday. We'd tell you when the Twins celebration ended, but we're not entirely sure it's over yet.

They earned every moment of that celebration, earned it with their amazing September stretch run, earned it by winning four in a row starting last Thursday in Detroit, earned it by winning again Tuesday, finally beating the Tigers 6-5 in 12 innings in what was, yes, one of the greatest games ever.

They earned the celebration, but they also earned that trip to New York, and that playoff meeting with the Yankees.

No one will give them a chance. No one was going to give them a chance, anyway, but now there's really no way, considering the energy and emotion they had to spend just to get through this one wild game.

Unless ... unless ... well, unless the Twins can just carry this high all the way to Yankee Stadium and somehow play better baseball than they've ever played before.

"We'll be ready," Span said.

But won't they be physically drained, emotionally drained, drained in every way?

"I don't see how that can even be possible," he said.

Everything tells you the Twins have no chance, from the matchups ("Would you take Matt Tolbert or A-Rod at third base?" one local asked, laughing) to the history (the Twins were 0-7 against the Yankees this year, 3-23 in the Bronx over the last eight regular seasons and losers in two previous first-round meetings with the Yankees) to the fact that it's got to be hard to win a game when you still haven't finished celebrating the last one.

Their Game 1 starter is Brian Duensing -- 26-year-old Brian Duensing -- who came to spring training hoping to impress enough that he might get a September call-up. The Twins skipped him from a scheduled start Sunday against the Royals, deciding to hand the ball to veteran Carl Pavano instead.

Now, Duensing is starting at Yankee Stadium, against CC Sabathia. And preparing for it with a champagne party the night before.

He was, to his credit, standing off to the side of the celebration, but that may have been more out of disbelief than of any sense of responsibility to be ready for Wednesday.

'This is one of the best games I've ever been involved in,' Tigers skipper Jim Leyland says. (Getty Images)

"The fact that this is happening is ridiculous," Duensing said. "It's still kind of surreal right now."

Down the hall in the Tiger clubhouse, they probably had a little of that surreal feel themselves. They were supposed to be the ones celebrating, the ones going to New York to take on the mighty Yankees.

They were the ones with the seven-game lead in early September, the ones who survived their home series with the Twins last week and held a three-game lead with four games to play.

Now, they're the ones who collapsed, except that after a game as great as Tuesday's, it just doesn't feel right to rip them for that collapse.

"I don't think there's a manager alive who could be disappointed in this team right now," Tiger manager Jim Leyland said. "Both teams played their hearts out. You can't ask for anything more. ... This is one of the best games I've ever been involved in, one of the best baseball games I've ever been involved in."

Leyland and the Tigers had a legitimate gripe, because replays showed that a Bobby Keppel pitch had nicked Brandon Inge's jersey with the bases loaded in the top of the 12th. Home-plate umpire Randy Marsh ruled otherwise, the Tigers didn't score and then the Twins won it on Alexi Casilla's single a few minutes later.

To his credit, Leyland didn't complain much about the call. Instead, he praised his team, and praised the Twins and praised everything about this remarkable night.

"After about 10 innings, I said I've never seen anything like this," Twins manager Ron Gardenhire said. "We made some great plays. They made some great plays. That was just sick baseball. Kids use that word, and that's exactly what it was -- sick."

About that time, someone asked Gardenhire about his rotation for the Yankee series (it'll be Duensing, then Nick Blackburn, then either Pavano or Tuesday starter Scott Baker).

On the other side of the office, third-base coach Scott Ullger looked up and asked, "We've got a game tomorrow?"

They've got a game, one that's supposed to feel more important than any game they've played so far, one that is going to have a hard time matching the one they just played.

"This game is going to live forever," Gardenhire said. "People are going to talk about it forever. ... It's a game for the ages, really."

A game for the ages, and then a celebration like no other.

They sprayed champagne. They looked at the clock.

And before they knew it they were on the way to New York.