A Minnesota Wild team on fire in Ottawa

OTTAWA (As per the Associated Press and TSN)—A van carrying equipment for the Minnesota Wild caught fire on Friday and left the team scrambling ahead of its game against the Ottawa Senators.

The fire occurred following the team’s afternoon practice at the Kanata Recreation Center in Ottawa.

The team was still determining the extent of the damage, but said that all of goaltender Nicklas Backstrom’s(notes) equipment was destroyed.

The Wild beat the Montreal Canadiens 3-1 on Thursday night and had traveled to Ottawa ahead of their game against the Senators on Saturday.

The fire began at approximately 2:30pm eastern as the van was backing into Scotiabank place. Firefighters remained on the scene for about 40 minutes. Police say that there were no injuries however a significant amount of the equipment inside was destroyed. Police are still investigating the cause of the blaze.

According to the Twitter feed of the Minnesota Wild (twitter/mnwild) the team is taking inventory to determine the extent of the damage. According to a report by the CANADIAN PRESS all of goaltender Nicklas Backstrom’s equipment was destroyed. It appears as though at least some of the Wild players are now left without any skates, sticks or equipment and will need to purchase completely new equipment before tomorrow’s game.

The Wild are now in touch with the National Hockey League to determine what options they may have.

-TSN.ca