MINNEAPOLIS — Luke Keaschall doesn’t like to make excuses.

The Minnesota Twins second baseman doesn’t want to conveniently blame a strange early-season schedule or frigid weather for a slow start. As Keaschall sees it, if he’s on the field, no matter what the temperature is, he’s ready to go.

After a torrid spring, Keaschall acknowledged feeling frustrated Monday afternoon, but the second-year player also expressed confidence that his start is merely a blip on the radar; he’s excited about the season ahead.

Even so, Twins outfielder Matt Wallner sensed Keaschall took some of his frustration with him to the plate in the fifth inning. In the dugout, Wallner predicted his young teammate would come through in a critical spot, and Keaschall followed by hitting a two-run homer to put the Twins back in the lead minutes after a Detroit Tigers rally tied the game.

Keaschall homered, walked twice and scored a pair of runs, as did Byron Buxton, who doubled and walked in five trips in a 7-3 victory over the Tigers at Target Field.

Paired with a late two-run single by Victor Caratini, just enough from Joe Ryan and four scoreless innings from the bullpen, the Twins snapped a two-game losing streak.

“Talk to me on Game 162,” Keaschall said. “We’re going to get there. Am I frustrated? Everybody gets frustrated when they’re not doing great. But that’s life, and the more you can stay even-keel while you’re frustrated, the better you’re going to be. The more you can stay even-keel while you’re doing good is even more important. You’ve got to try and not get too high or too low.”

Luke Keaschall sends his first home run of the season right into a fan’s glove and gives the @Twins the lead! pic.twitter.com/9zVVVzykOd

— MLB (@MLB) April 7, 2026

Though there already have been several lows, panic hasn’t surfaced in the Twins’ clubhouse about the slow starts from Keaschall and Buxton, who are expected to be the team’s offensive catalysts. Still, the Twins certainly preferred a better start than one that’s seen the offense limited to one run four times in the early going.

Entering Monday’s series opener, Keaschall carried a .506 OPS, and Buxton’s was .415. Overall, six Twins regulars with at least 23 plate appearances brought a sub-.600 OPS into Monday’s game.

But the Twins also knew it would only be a matter of time before the pair gets going and their dynamic play would trickle down to the rest of the group.

“The least of my concerns right now is Luke Keaschall,” Twins manager Derek Shelton said. “Buck is going to hit. And I told Buck this, actually, at some point before the game. I have a lot of worries in my life; Byron Buxton hitting is not one of them. He’s going to.”

Both men stepped up in ideal spots Monday.

None was bigger than Keaschall’s blast in the fourth. After watching Ryan labor through the fourth inning in near-freezing temperatures (the wind chill at first pitch was 29 degrees), the Twins wanted to give their All-Star starting pitcher ample time to recuperate and warm up in the clubhouse. Efficient for his first three innings, Ryan’s 39 pitches while allowing three runs in the fourth were one fewer than he’d combined to throw in the first three frames.

With one out and Trevor Larnach (two singles, two runs) on first, Keaschall ripped a 2-1 fastball on the hands from Detroit’s Casey Mize out to left, a 367-foot homer with just enough giddyap to give the Twins a 5-3 lead.

“The offense did a really good job with long at-bats, they scored some runs there and gave me time to recover and get a little warmer inside,” Ryan said. “That’s always appreciated. … They picked me back up.”

They also propped up Ryan the inning before with a three-run rally started when Buxton led off the third inning with a double, his first extra-base hit since March 29. Though they came up empty with the bases loaded in the second inning, the Twins wouldn’t waste their later chances. After Buxton doubled, Larnach singled, and Keaschall walked to load the bases. One out later, Caratini’s sac fly gave the Twins a 1-0 lead.

Wallner and Royce Lewis extended the lead to three runs with a pair of two-out, RBI singles.

Keaschall also extended a putaway rally in the eighth inning when he drew another walk to load the bases ahead of Caratini’s two-out, two-run single.

“Baseball comes in waves,” Keaschall said afterward. “I feel you’re going to have some really hot stretches and some really cold stretches, but the shorter you can keep the cold and the more even keeled you can stay through it, the better. You can’t hit 1.000 your whole life, so just try to be the same guy every day and keep fighting and find your best self.”

Keaschall demonstrated what his best self can look like all spring. Everything off the former top prospect’s bat was a laser as he sliced and diced Grapefruit League pitchers. Keaschall batted .377/.411/.717 over 56 plate appearances.

“I felt electric,” Keaschall said. “I felt like I was firing on all cylinders.”

But when the season started, Keaschall wasn’t on the same track. Balls that evaded gloves in Florida found them in Baltimore, Kansas City and at home. Keaschall, who had a .340 average on balls in play last season, had only a .250 BABIP entering Monday. A player expected to wreak havoc on the bases was struggling to do so.

Still, it was only nine games.

Asked whether he thought a pair of early off days disrupted his rhythm, Keaschall shrugged it off. The fact there were seven game times for first pitch in the team’s first nine games doesn’t bother him, either. Keaschall offered a similar response when asked about playing in frigid temperatures at Target Field.

“I don’t like excuses,” Keaschall said. “I felt great this spring, and then I haven’t been as hot as I’d like to be to start the year, but that’s baseball. I’m trying to find it. I’m close. Obviously, I’m not where I need to be, but I’ll find it soon.”

Keaschall thought his teammates were of a similar mindset. Yes, the Twins had struggled. But everyone recognizes they’re only one-sixteenth of the way into a season, and the offense could turn it around quickly.

“Guys understand we play 162 games in a season,” Keaschall said. “We’re not going to stress too much if we don’t have the best first 10 games of the year. We won (13) games in a row last year. Things can change in the snap of a finger. The more you can think like that, the better.”

Rookie Laweryson recognized after win

Before he addressed the media Monday, Cody Laweryson needed a few extra minutes to clean up. The rookie pitcher’s teammates showered him with beer and other substances after he retired all five batters he faced and converted the first save of his career.

With two Twins ahead by two runs, Laweryson entered in the eighth and stranded a pair of runners left on by Kody Funderburk to preserve the lead. When Caratini’s eighth-inning hit extended the lead to four, Cole Sands sat down in the bullpen, and Laweryson was asked to secure the ninth inning as well. He did so with an easy 1-2-3 inning.

“It feels pretty good,” Laweryson said. “I’m just trying to stay locked in until Shelty shakes my hand. He hadn’t done that. I kind of figured that was the situation. Cole is one of our guys, and he could’ve got the job done if it was a two-run lead. Once we got it to four, I was still locked in regardless, but I knew it was probably my inning again.”