MINNEAPOLIS — Derek Jeter is in Tampa. Eduardo Nunez is in Charleston. Reid Brignac is in Colorado Springs. Tuesday, Jayson Nix was on the bench with a balky right hamstring.
With nobody else available to play shortstop, manager Joe Girardi turned to Alberto Gonzalez and watched the light-hitting journeyman infielder join the sizzling Robinson Cano as the hitting stars of a 7-3 Yankees win over the Twins in front of 29,029 at Target Field.
Making his fifth start at short, Gonzalez played as big a part as Cano in helping the Yankees roll to their second straight victory and remain six games behind the AL East-leading Red Sox.
Gonzalez drove in two of the three Yankees runs in the fifth with a double and added a check-swing, RBI single in the seventh. Cano added a three-run homer to his latest hot streak, his fourth homer in the last three games. Cano, who singled in the fourth, is on a 17-for-34 (.500) ride and answering questions about whether he is capable of carrying a team. He has 20 homers.
Gonzalez also made a diving catch in short left to deny Joe Mauer of a hit in the fifth.
Phil Hughes benefitted from Gonzalez and Cano delivering in the clutch to win his second straight game and improve to 4-7.
In seven innings, Hughes allowed a run, six hits, walked two and fanned three. Across his last two outings, Hughes is 1-1 with a 1.80 ERA at a time when the Yankees rotation has fizzled a bit.
Beating the Twins is nothing new for the Yankees, who have copped 23 of the last 30 regular-season games and 29 of the 35 overall. At Target Field, which opened in 2009, the Yankees have won nine of 12 regular-season games.
Hughes was effective through five innings when he gave up a run and six hits. He limited the Twins to one hit in seven at-bats with runners in scoring position.
Trailing 1-0 in the fifth, the Yankees used Gonzalez’s two-run double into the right-field corner to erase the deficit and then upped the lead to 3-1 on Ichiro Suzuki’s infield single that was bobbled by Twins starter Samuel Deduno.
Lyle Overbay’s 45-foot infield single toward third base opened the rally and the slumping David Adams’ single to center brought Gonzalez, the No. 9 hitter, to the plate.
Gonzalez took a 1-1 pitch the other way to score Overbay and Adams. Brett Gardner’s grounder to the right side moved Gonzalez to third and he scored on Ichiro’s dribbler near the first base line that spilled out of Deduno’s glove.
Mariano Rivera picked up his 27th save by recording the game’s final out. Called on with two runners on and the tying run on-deck, Rivera forced Ryan Doumit to ground out to short to finish off the Twins.
george.king@nypost.com