SAINT PAUL, Minn. - This Thanksgiving, the Minnesota Wild is teaming up with youth hockey tournaments throughout the State of Hockey to expand the reach of the team's annual food drive, in partnership with Toyota.

The Minnesota Wild State of Hockey Food Drive will begin on Monday, Nov. 20, when the Wild takes on the New Jersey Devils at 7 p.m. at Xcel Energy Center. Second Harvest Heartland volunteers will be collecting non-perishable food items and cash donations at Gates 1-5 from 5:30 p.m. until the start of the first period. Toyota will match up to $5,000 in monetary donations received online and at the Minnesota Wild game on Nov. 20.

From Wednesday - Sunday Nov. 22-26, youth hockey tournaments taking place throughout the State of Hockey will be accepting donations to help stock local food banks and food shelves. Teams and spectators are encouraged to donate non-perishable food items. Visit wild.com/fooddrive for a list of participating tournaments.

Fans can also make a monetary donation online at wild.com/fooddrive. For every $1 donated, Second Harvest Heartland and food banks serving Minnesota can provide up to three meals to the most vulnerable members of our community.

Second Harvest Heartland and local food banks will coordinate distribution of items collected statewide to food shelves in each respective area. Twin Cities Toyota dealers will provide vehicles for the Wild to deliver donated food items from its game to Second Harvest Heartland's Maplewood warehouse. Toyota is the Official Vehicle of the Minnesota Wild.

One in 10 households in Minnesota is affected by hunger. Hunger is an urban, suburban and rural problem. There is no corner of the state where hunger does not exist.

Minnesota Wild tickets for the 2017-18 regular season are on sale now at ticketmaster.com or the Xcel Energy Center Box Office. For information about Minnesota Wild Season Tickets or to join the Wild Warming House, the only way to secure priority access to future season tickets, visit tickets.wild.com or contact a Wild Ticket Sales Representative at 651-222-WILD.

Visit www.wild.com/pressbox for the latest news and information from the team including press releases, game notes, postgame notes, multimedia content and daily statistics.

About Second Harvest Heartland

Second Harvest Heartland is one of the nation's largest, most efficient and most innovative hunger relief organizations. Second Harvest Heartland provides an average of 75 percent of all food distributed by its food shelf partners, and in 2016, provided more than 80 million meals to nearly 1,000 food shelves, pantries and other partner programs serving 59 counties in Minnesota and western Wisconsin. Second Harvest Heartland leads through innovation, finding efficient, effective solutions to connect the full resources of our community with our hungry neighbors. For more information, visit 2harvest.org or call 651.484.5117.