Minnesota
Game Preview, 1/23: Utah Hockey Club vs. Minnesota Wild | Utah Hockey Club
WHEN: 6:00 p.m. MT
WHERE: Xcel Energy Center – St. Paul, Minnesota
TV: ESPN+, Hulu | RADIO: KSL Sports Zone 1280 AM, NHL App
The Utah Hockey Club (20-19-7) continues a grueling stretch of games against top competition with a matchup tonight against the Minnesota Wild (28-15-4) at Xcel Energy Center. While Utah is four points out of the second wild card spot in the Western Conference after two straight wins, Minnesota is entrenched in second place in the Central Division with 60 points. Tonight is the first game of a back-to-back and the first of a three-game road trip for Utah. This evening also marks the second of three straight matchups against the top two teams in the Central Division (Winnipeg, Minnesota).
ONE-TIMERS
- Logan Cooley has goals in four straight games.
- Olli Määttä scored his first goal of the season on Monday against Winnipeg.
- Barrett Hayton produced his first three-point night of the season on Monday and was named the game’s first star.
- Utah’s Nick Bjugstad is a native of Blaine, Minnesota and played at the University of Minnesota.
- Utah has scored nine total goals over its last two games.
TONIGHT’S MATCHUP
The Wild raced through the first part of the season, earning points in 21 of their first 25 games. Over the last two months, Minnesota has come back down to earth with a 7-7-0 record in December and a 5-4-0 record in January so far. A big reason for the downward trend has been the absence of Hart Trophy candidate Kirill Kaprizov since Dec. 23 due to injury. Kaprizov, who had 50 points (23G, 27A) in 34 games before injury, changes the dynamic of a game when he is in the lineup. Even without Kaprizov in the lineup, the Wild are a force to be reckoned with up front with talented forwards like Matt Boldy, Marco Rossi, and Joel Eriksson Ek. In net, Filip Gustavsson and Marc-Andre Fleury make up one of the stingiest goaltending tandems in the league with a combined save percentage of .913.
WHO TO WATCH
UTAH: #92 LOGAN COOLEY – Cooley has goals in four straight games, tying him for the longest goal streak of Utah’s season with Kevin Stenlund. The young center has 42 points (15G, 27A) in 46 games for Utah and ranks second on the team in scoring.
MINNESOTA: #12 MATT BOLDY – Boldy has been productive recently for Minnesota with five goals over his last eight games. He also has four multi-point games over the last eight contests and is second on the Wild in scoring with 41 points (18G, 23A) in 47 contests.
LOOK BACK
Utah tamed the top team in the Western Conference on Monday night at Delta Center with a 5-2 win over the conference-leading Winnipeg Jets. The game was scoreless until 36 minutes in, when Olli Määttä buried a slapshot from the blue line for his first goal of the season. Later in the second with just 18 seconds remaining in the period, Logan Cooley scored on a two-on-one to extend Utah’s lead. The line of Barrett Hayton, Josh Doan, and Matias Maccelli produced two more tallies in the third to cement Utah’s lead; Hayton netted a crafty setup from Doan off the rush, and Maccelli lit the lamp after a tic-tac-toe passing play involving the entire line. Winnipeg pushed back with two goals of their own in the third, but Clayton Keller scored the empty-netter to clinch the win.
LAST MEETING
Utah extended a winning streak to four and a road winning streak to seven with a 2-1 win over the Minnesota Wild at Xcel Energy Center on Dec. 20. The Wild’s Mats Zuccarello led off the scoring in the middle of the first, but only a minute later, Dylan Guenther knocked in a rebound from a Jack McBain shot and tied the game. Guenther scored the game-winner and his second of the game later in the third period on the power play. Goaltender Karel Vejmelka was stellar once again with 28 saves on 29 shots. Utah’s penalty kill came up big with a five-for-five effort against the Wild.
CLAYTON KELLER
With a goal and an assist on Monday against Winnipeg, Clayton Keller now has multiple points in each of his last two games and three of his last four. During his current four-game point streak, the Utah captain has amassed nine points (2G, 7A), including a four-point night on Jan. 18 against St. Louis. The nine points is tied for the most in a four-game span that Keller has tabulated this season. The 26-year-old is off to the best statistical start of his career, and he currently leads Utah with 50 points (16G, 34A). He reached the 40-point plateau in just 39 games this season- five games faster than his previous fastest 40 points which came last season with the Arizona Coyotes in 44 contests. Keller is on pace for 90 points this season, which would be a new career high.
BARRETT HAYTON
Barrett Hayton registered his first three-point night of the season on Monday against Winnipeg with a goal and two assists. Monday also marked his first three-point night since the 2022-23 campaign, and the fifth of his career. Hayton has 23 points (9G, 14A) in 46 games this season, and he is tied for second on the team with a +7 rating. The centerman also tabbed two assists on Jan. 16 against the New York Rangers and now has five points (1G, 4A) over his last three contests.
LOOK AHEAD
Utah continues the road trip tomorrow with a rematch against the Winnipeg Jets. Tomorrow’s game at Canada Life Centre will be the third meeting of the season between the teams after Winnipeg defeated Utah 3-0 on Nov. 5, and Utah returned the favor 5-2 on Jan. 20. Tomorrow’s puck drop is scheduled for 6 p.m. MT.
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Fox – Seattle
A bipartisan group of Minnesota lawmakers are hoping to limit how the artificial intelligence industry operates in the state, arguing that it’s evolving in ways that are harmful and unconstitutional.
Minnesota senators on Monday considered five measures to regulate AI, including a bill (SF 1857) stating that companies that create AI chatbots — like ChatGPT — ensure minors do not access them, and a bill (SF 1886) requiring that companies disclose when a person is communicating with AI.
Sens. Erin Maye Quade, DFL-Apple Valley, and Eric Lucero, R-St. Michael, are leading the bipartisan effort to regulate AI. The duo — who are on opposite sides of the political spectrum — said they aren’t opposed to the technology but urged lawmakers to protect Minnesotans. Maye Quade and Lucero were co-authors of a bill regulating deepfakes — digitally altered photos or videos depicting events that didn’t actually happen — which became law in 2023.
“There’s a recognition that we need to do something to bring controls in place, to uphold the Constitution, to protect privacy and to empower individuals against these multi-billion dollar industries,” said Lucero, who works in cybersecurity, on Monday.
One of Maye Quade and Lucero’s bills (SF 1120) would prohibit the government from requesting reverse-location data, which many law enforcement agencies use when they do not know who specifically committed a crime.
Law enforcement can obtain a warrant that mandates a technology company give them data about which cellphones were in a certain location at a specific time or who has searched for a specific word or phrase on their phones or on an AI chatbot.
Civil liberties advocates argue warrants are supposed to be narrow, and these so-called “reverse warrants” allow the government to conduct widespread surveillance on everyone who was in an area at a given time or on people who are searching for words or phrases. This is a violation of the Fourth Amendment, advocates argue.
Law enforcement officials, including the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension, testified against the bill, arguing that it would harm public safety.
“While I certainly appreciate Sen. Maye Quade’s intentions to protect individuals’ privacy rights with such technological capabilities, prohibiting this critical investigative tool would have extensive negative consequences in local and state investigations,” BCA Superintendent Drew Evans stated in written testimony. “It would impact the ability for law enforcement to prevent and solve crimes and to hold individuals accountable.”
A growing number of states are seeking to regulate AI, as more companies seek to capitalize on the technology. Last year, 38 states adopted or enacted around 100 AI-related measures, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures.
But the federal government has sought to curb states’ ability to regulate AI, as companies are furiously lobbying Congress and the White House to get rid of state regulations. Lawmakers last summer attempted to include a 10-year moratorium on state AI laws in the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, but the Senate dropped it.
President Donald Trump in December signed an executive order giving the attorney general the ability to sue states and overturn laws that don’t support the “United States’ global AI dominance.”
Maye Quade said that minors should be prohibited from accessing AI chatbots because the machine could introduce virtually any topic including disturbing content.
Maye Quade said she’s been talking to AI companies about the regulations and believes they could reach a compromise, but she said she’s okay if they oppose the bills.
Maye Quade said that states shouldn’t back down from trying to regulate AI.
“For decades, tech companies have told legislators and the public that damage and destruction from their unregulated products are necessary byproducts of growth and innovation. They have told us that they can do amazing things, like cure cancer, but not comply with 50 different laws in states. We can no longer accept that narrative,” Maye Quade said.
Minnesota Reformer is part of States Newsroom, the nation’s largest state-focused nonprofit news organization.
ST. PAUL, Minn. (FOX 9) – ATMs that deal in cryptocurrency could be banned in Minnesota soon.
Crypto ATM ban considered
The backstory:
Police across the state are urging lawmakers to pass a DFL ban on those kiosks that convert cash to crypto.
They say the machines are used extensively by criminals trying to scam people or to hide the proceeds of their crimes. In 2024, lawmakers passed a law to regulate the machines. Still, last year Attorney General Keith Ellison warned of an increase in crypto ATM scams.
At a hearing last month, Faribault police reported their residents had lost $500,000 since 2022 from crypto ATM scams. Woodbury Detective Lynn Lawrence told lawmakers about a victim she helped who had completed at least ten Bitcoin transactions over six months at crypto ATMs.
By the numbers:
Right now there are about 350 crypto kiosks in the state. They are often located in gas stations and grocery stores.
Their owners say this proposed law goes too far, but they’d support a law requiring full refunds for any customers who were victims of fraud.
How crypto ATMs work
Dig deeper:
Crypto ATMs allow users to turn fiat money into digital currency or vice versa. Users typically have to scan their identification to be able to use the machines and then the currency is sent to a wallet of their choosing.
However, the machines are increasingly used by scammers who convince elderly victims to use the ATMs to use the machines to send them money. Once the money is sent, it’s impossible to recoup the funds from the scammers.
Exchanges can blacklist scammers’ wallets and block them from withdrawing ill-gotten funds. However, most scammers will use “mixers” which wash the funds through a service that makes the coins hard to track or find ways around large exchanges like decentralized exchanges and peer-to-peer exchanges.
The other side:
At a hearing on Tuesday, Larry Lipka, counsel for digital currency platform CoinFlip, which operates 50 crypto ATMs in Minnesota, recognized scams are an issue, but pointed out scamming won’t disappear if crypto kiosks are banned.
“While I understand that scams are a problem, scams are a problem everywhere in this country,” said Lipka, “They are a problem for crypto kiosks, they are a problem for wire transfers, and they are a problem for gift cards. But no one is here today saying we should ban exchanges or gift cards or wire transfers because scammers use them.”
Instead of a ban, Lipka urged lawmakers to instead consider smarter and better controls for kiosks. According to Lipka, back in 2024, CoinFlip pushed for further protections when the previous crypto ATM bill was being discussed, arguing that legislation didn’t go far enough.
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