Wild’s equipment truck catches fire.

When I saw this story at first I thought, you got to be kidding me. You really can't make this stuff up. I never have heard about a player’s equipment truck just bursting into flames. This sounds fishy and it’s going to be hard for the Wild to get all of their equipment replace for tomorrow’s game. Check out the Twitter pictures that someone took of the debris.

(updated 6:20 p.m. EST): Brunette after Wild's 6 p.m. meeting: "Looks like we're going to try to play, I guess."

(updated): Just talked to a bunch of players. They have a 6 p.m. EST meeting at their hotel with the team. There's lot of concern about playing in new equipment. It's not just a feel thing (it takes players weeks to break in equipment), but a safety thing. Knee braces and stuff like that were destroyed. How do you just throw a new knee brace on a player without making sure it fits properly? More soon.

Details are sketchy right now, but the Wild's equipment truck caught fire today destroying much of the Wild's equipment. [Here are pictures courtesy of a couple tweeters].

The Wild practiced at the Kanata Rec Center this afternoon in suburban Ottawa. After a short drive back to the Scotiabank place, trainers apparently got out in the parking lot and noticed the back smoky. When they opened up the back of the truck, much of the equipment was on fire.

Firefighters were called to put out the blaze, but much was destroyed. Police are investigating the cause of the fire, but equipment trainers have no clue.

"It was a five-minute drive," said bewildered head equipment trainer Tony DaCosta.

This is obviously unprecedented and the team is in complete scramble mode. Remember, in practice, players use their game gear, just not their normal game sweaters.

Assistant equipment trainer Brent Proulx is rushing back to Minnesota to gather equipment and bring it here tomorrow on a flight leaving 5:30 a.m., but the team is also on the phone with the league to determine what can be done regarding the game.

It is not easy for hockey players to just change equipment, and much of the gear was completely destroyed.