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Royce Lewis has played in 70 career regular-season games. Alex Bregman has played 86 games in the postseason alone.

• ALDS Game 1, presented by Booking.com: Today, 4:45 p.m. ET/3:45 CT on FS1

Bailey Ober, the Twins’ Game 1 starter, will be making his postseason debut. Opposite him, Justin Verlander is a future Hall of Famer with 35 playoff appearances.

In one corner are the young and surprising Twins, whom history indicated wouldn’t be here, given their 19 years of total playoff futility and 21 years without advancing in the postseason. In the other corner are the Astros, who boast arguably the most experienced playoff depth of this generation.

As Minnesota and Houston clash in the American League Division Series set to begin with Game 1 on Saturday at 3:45 p.m. at Minute Maid Park, the Twins will not only have to contend with a formidable and star-studded Astros rotation and lineup -- but also with the wealth of knowledge in the opposing dugout of what it takes to win on this stage. Can they bridge that gap?

“I don't really know if there's anything you can do,” Griffin Jax said. “You've just kind of got to embrace the moment, and especially for me, take what we learned these past two games against Toronto and just be ready for it. It's going to be a different kind of beast.

“They're very experienced. They're a different animal in October than they were when we faced them back in May and April.”

The Twins have done what they could from a roster-building standpoint to prepare themselves for this moment. Most obviously, they employ Carlos Correa, the closest thing this generation has to a “Mr. October.” They’ve also got Christian Vázquez, who was on last season’s World Series-winning Astros team and the ‘18 championship Red Sox team; Michael A. Taylor won a ring with Washington in 2019; Kenta Maeda was a fixture of many Dodgers playoff rosters.

But the majority of the Twins’ offense and bullpen is driven by the youth movement, from Lewis, Edouard Julien and Matt Wallner in the lineup to Louie Varland, Jax and Jhoan Duran among the leverage relief group -- and they’ll all be dealing with a hostile playoff crowd for the first time in Houston, too.

It’s all about taking it back to the basics, Vázquez said. The adjustment has to start somewhere.

“I think playing the game the right way,” Vázquez said. “Don't make errors. Make routine plays. Get all the outs we can. I think that's very important. Running the bases well. I think they have a good team over there, and they've been here a lot of years, and I think my experience and Carlos' experience is going to help us get through this.”

But if anyone isn’t going to be daunted by the task that lies ahead, it’s this group of confident youngsters. They’re the ones who finally delivered a playoff victory after 19 long years without one, and they’re the ones who advanced in the playoffs after 21 years without this organization having done so.

They know what they’re capable of, and they’ve already gotten a little taste of what it will take, with Lewis having risen to the occasion in the Game 1 victory over the Blue Jays in the Wild Card Series.

“I think the majority of the conversation is just understanding that, yes, they're very good, but they're human just like we are,” Lewis said. “You can't put other players or other people on a pedestal in this game, because this game is very hard.

“Yeah, it's Justin Verlander, but at the same time, guess what, guys, he's got a four-seam fastball. Didn't we just face that with [Kevin] Gausman? He's got a curveball. We just faced that two weeks ago with [Lucas] Giolito. They're all the same. They all have to come over the plate, they've got to throw strikes, they've got to execute.”

The Astros finished the regular season with an active roster that featured 17 returnees from last year’s World Series-winning group. It’s time to see how these Twins stack up.