Anthony Edwards was surrounded and the Minnesota Timberwolves were in danger of another devastating loss.
As he dribbled toward the corner with a two-point lead in the closing seconds of overtime Friday night, Sacramento’s Domantas Sabonis, Keon Ellis and De’Aaron Fox were all within a step of him. He had nowhere to go and the shot clock was winding down, so Edwards made a familiar decision when he needed a bailout. He elevated.
Sabonis got a hand right in his face, but it was too late. Edwards drilled the kind of highly contested, on-the-move jumper that few others in the league can replicate.
A 130-126 victory was secured. An embarrassing three-game losing streak was snapped. A potentially catastrophic loss after they led by 20 points in the third quarter was avoided in Sacramento, Calif.
HE’S HIM. 🐜 pic.twitter.com/4dzPY9XWRq
— Minnesota Timberwolves (@Timberwolves) November 16, 2024
The victory will do little to quell the unease about Minnesota’s lackluster start to this highly anticipated season. They looked like last season’s Wolves in the first three quarters, playing hard-nosed defense, hitting open 3-pointers and building up a 16-point lead heading into the fourth. Then came a 33-17 fourth quarter in which they could not hit a shot and could not find an answer for Fox, who scored a whopping 60 points in the game.
Jaden McDaniels’ defense continues to be glaringly absent, as does the effort on that end from Edwards. Julius Randle only grabbed four rebounds and coach Chris Finch missed the mark on a few decisions down the stretch. But it was a much-needed victory in a difficult place to play, although the Wolves have won five straight at the Golden 1 Center.
Edwards’ heroics were jaw-dropping, offering a reminder of why there is so much hype surrounding him. He had played a messy fourth quarter, committing silly turnovers, leaving his man on the wing for wide-open jumpers and exhibiting questionable shot selection with some of the 3s he took early in the clock. And yet, when the Timberwolves needed him most, Edwards was there to put the team on his back and carry them through.
It wasn’t just in overtime. The Wolves (7-6) trailed by four points with 90 seconds to play when Edwards converted an and-1. Then he rebounded a rare miss from Fox, went right down the floor and scored another three-point play for a 115-113 lead.
BACK TO BACK ANT-1’S 🐜 pic.twitter.com/VZ69MfKg4a
— Minnesota Timberwolves (@Timberwolves) November 16, 2024
Fox hit a floater to send it to overtime, where Edwards scored seven of the team’s 15 points, hit all three of his shots and added two rebounds and two assists. He finished with 36 points, six 3s and five rebounds in 42 minutes, helping the Wolves survive a feisty Kings team playing without DeMar DeRozan and Malik Monk.
Considerable digital ink has been spilled on the Timberwolves’ woes early this season. There are real reasons to be concerned, including their defensive falloff, the fact that they have played a relatively easy schedule to start and have not taken advantage of it and have been healthy while other teams are suffering.
The two-game sweep at the hands of lowly Portland had alarm bells blaring in Wolves land, even though they were only 12 games into the season. While there has been panic among the fans who have watched Karl-Anthony Towns crush it in New York while Randle and Donte DiVincenzo have struggled, it is not hard to find reasons to be levelheaded.
Randle is still working his way back
It feels like this hasn’t been discussed much at all early this season, but when Randle took the floor in the season opener in Los Angeles, it was his first real NBA action in nine months. A shoulder injury that required surgery kept him out of the final three months of last season and also limited his availability in his first preseason in Minnesota.
Randle only played one game in the preseason, reminiscent of when Gobert first arrived in 2022 and did not get much time at all in training camp and preseason because he was banged up after playing in the FIBA World Cup. The combination of his health and new surroundings meant that it took Gobert until January before he started to look like himself.
The Wolves can’t wait that long for Randle to round into form, but it does look like he’s still finding his feel. He has always been a deliberate offensive player, but there seems to be more tentativeness in his game than ever before. Finch has had to talk to him several times this season about being more aggressive. He scored 26 points on 8-of-20 shooting against the Kings, the most shots he has taken in a game this season.
There were some ugly turnovers and his defense leaves a lot to be desired, but he played with more force in this game, including on a tough driving layup against Trey Lyles for a 128-126 lead, which proved to be the game winner.
Randle is far from a perfect player and it could be that the fit with Edwards and Gobert just isn’t the right one. But there is a lot more game there than what we had seen over the last 10 days or so. He’s a multi-time All-Star and All-NBA player, a deft isolation scorer and a rugged competitor. Maybe he just needs more time to settle in, jell with teammates and get his feel for the game back after such a long layoff.
DiVincenzo will hit some shots
The new guard made quite a first impression in the preseason when he barely missed a shot and got into a tussle with his old Knicks friends in New York. The regular season has not been nearly as kind. DiVincenzo is shooting 30 percent from 3, and some of his misses against Sacramento weren’t even close.
History would suggest that is going to turn around sometime soon. DiVincenzo made 40 percent of his 3s in each of his previous two seasons in Golden State and New York. He shot almost nine per game and started 63 times with the Knicks. Now he is coming off the bench in Minnesota, playing fewer minutes and getting fewer shots. So it may just be taking some time for him to adjust to a new role in a new setting.
One thing that is concerning with DiVincenzo is his propensity to turn the ball over. Throughout training camp, there was discussion from coaches and teammates about his underrated playmaking. That left open the possibility of him being the primary backup point guard to Mike Conley. So far in the regular season, DiVincenzo has been shaky when orchestrating the offense. He is averaging 2.6 turnovers per 36 minutes, the highest number since he was in Milwaukee in 2021-22.
Pairing him more with Conley in the backcourt could help DiVincenzo find the shooting stroke that has eluded him this season. When he starts knocking them down, the floor will open up a lot more for Edwards to get to the basket.
Finch will figure things out
The social media pitchforks have been out for Finch while the team has struggled. His unwillingness to expand the rotation, an occasionally slow trigger finger on timeouts when the opposing team is going on a run and some curious lineup choices have all been cited by critics of his coaching style.
Some of that was on display again on Friday night. Finch allowed the Kings to rip off a 14-0 run before he called a timeout three minutes into the fourth quarter. He may have waited on it because he took two timeouts within 80 seconds of each other in the third quarter when he started to notice the defense slipping. But letting that run explode the way it did in the fourth changed the entire game.
At the end of regulation, when the Wolves had a shot to win the game and 16 seconds to play, Finch sent out a lineup that included Conley, Randle, Gobert, Edwards and … McDaniels, who has struggled mightily with his shot this season. Of course, the ball ended up in his hands with a wide-open look from the corner, and he missed it to set up overtime.
Once in overtime, McDaniels did hit a big 3 to help the Wolves prevail. But it was hard to understand why Naz Reid, who played a terrible game defensively but was shooting it well, or even Nickeil Alexander-Walker, a much more reliable shooter to this point this season, was not on the floor instead.
Decisions like that speak to a coach who has not yet gotten his finger on this roster’s pulse. But Finch is a proven, respected coach, and he is surrounded by a high-quality staff that has been together for years. He has proven to be a top-shelf leader and has brought the team to the playoffs in each of his three full seasons on the job. It may be taking longer than some would like, but Finch will eventually find a way to make the pieces of the puzzle fit together better because he’s shown in the past he is fully capable of doing just that.
None of these things is guaranteed to happen. This team may not find itself. McDaniels and Edwards will not be able to find their defense. Maybe Gobert and Conley are getting too old. Maybe DiVincenzo’s shot won’t start falling. But look around the league. The Knicks are starting slow after their two big trades. The Dallas Mavericks, which added Klay Thompson, are struggling after their run to the NBA Finals. Milwaukee can’t seem to get it together.
It’s all still right there for the Wolves if they can learn from the mistakes of the first month and rediscover the intensity of the 2023-24 team. The season is still young, but it’s getting older every day.
(Photo of Anthony Edwards: Rocky Widner / NBAE via Getty Images)
