It took five months, 67 games, and endless whining from the fanbase, but the Minnesota Timberwolves are finally playing like title contenders with 15 regular-season games to go.
The Wolves are riding a season-best six-game win streak. They are a season-high nine games above .500. The Timberwolves have solidified their play-in spot and are neck and neck with the Golden State Warriors for the sixth and final guaranteed playoff spot in the West. They are also only 4.5 games behind the second-seeded Memphis Grizzlies.
Most Wolves fans have said something along the lines of, They’re finally starting to look like last year’s Wolves. It’s not wrong. Still, Minnesota’s midseason turnaround is more reminiscent of the team that dog-walked the Timberwolves on the way to the NBA Finals last year.
Yes, long before Nico Harrison made one of the worst, most shocking trades in NBA history by handing Luka Doncic over to the Los Angeles Lakers for reasons that get even more muddled every time Patrick Dumont speaks in public. But we’re talking about before Doncic led the Mavericks to the franchise’s first finals appearance since 2011. Before Doncic hit the stepback over Rudy Gobert to win Game 2 of the Western Conference Finals and essentially end Minnesota’s magical playoff run, the Mavericks kinda sucked for most of the 2023-24 season.
After the Mavericks jumped out to a respectable 15-8 record a quarter of the way through the 2023-24 season, they began to fall back slowly to the median. Dallas went 11-15 over the next 26 games, sitting at 26-23 and firmly in 8th place in the Western Conference on February 3. Doncic averaged 34.8 points per game and had an all-world season in his sixth year in the NBA. Kyrie Irving had missed 22 of the team’s first 49 games, and the rest of the supporting cast was not up to snuff.
On February 8, Nico Harrison did something nobody saw coming.
He made two savvy trades.
Harrison swung two separate trades to bring in P.J. Washington from the Charlotte Hornets and Daniel Gafford from the Washington Wizards to bolster the roster around Luka and Kyrie and see if they can make any forward momentum in the West.
The Mavericks finished the season 21-9 with Washington and Gafford in the mix and nabbed the fifth seed, setting up a first-round playoff series with the LA Clippers. Dallas dispatched Los Angeles in six games and surprised everyone by taking down the top-seeded Oklahoma City Thunder in the conference semifinals, setting up the matchup with the Timberwolves in the West Finals.
I won’t rehash what happened in that series, but the Mavericks went from the middle of the pack in a loaded Western Conference to the NBA Finals in four months. The Boston Celtics trounced them in the Finals, and it’s been a nightmare for Mavericks fans ever since. Luka is on the Lakers. Anthony Davis went down in his first game in Dallas. Kyrie Irving tore his ACL, and Nico Harrison and Patrick Dumont keep saying things out loud.
The Timberwolves have had an up-and-down season this year, coming off one of the best years in franchise history. Tim Connelly traded Karl-Anthony Towns to the New York Knicks for Julius Randle and Donte DiVincenzo days before training camp opened. The vibe was off from the start, and the Wolves quickly wiped out a decent start to the season by falling to 8-10 after a gut-wrenching loss to the Sacramento Kings, in which the Wolves led by 12 points in the fourth quarter.
Minnesota hung around .500 through the first half of the season thanks to revolving three-game winning streaks and three-game losing streaks. The Wolves found some footing in January and February without DiVincenzo and Randle. Still, the Wolves lost to the Lakers in a game where Anthony Edwards was ejected for two technical fouls, which meant he would be suspended for the following game against the Utah Jazz. The Wolves lost by one point in Salt Lake City and fell to 32-29 and ninth place in the West.
Since losing to Utah, the Wolves have reintegrated Julius Randle and Rody Gobert into the starting lineup and rattled off six consecutive wins.
Minnesota has won the last 11 games that Randle has played, and he’s finally found his role in the rotation three-quarters of the way through his first year in Minnesota. Randle is averaging 18.8 points, 7.5 rebounds, and 6.5 assists per game since he returned from his groin injury.
DiVincenzo is shooting 50 percent from three since his return from a toe injury. Jaden McDaniels and Naz Reid are taking a leap after a slow start to the season, and the Timberwolves are in the top ten in offensive rating this season and second over the last six games. If the Wolves are going to make a run at another conference finals or beyond, now is the time.
Minnesota has 15 games remaining and has by far the easiest schedule of any team in the playoff fight in the Western Conference. The Wolves begin a five-game homestand on Friday against the struggling Orlando Magic before welcoming the Jazz, Indiana Pacers, and New Orleans Pelicans to town.
With the way Minnesota has been playing over the last two weeks, the Wolves could easily push their winning streak to double digits and finish the season out with 12 wins and three losses, back door into a 50-win season, and push for homecourt advantage in the first found of the playoffs. However, they also could revert to the inconsistent team from October to February, drop a handful of winnable games, and have to fight their way through the Play-In.
The Mavericks wrote the manual on going from mediocre to runner-up last season. The Wolves could be the next team to follow in Dallas’ footsteps this year and salvage what most thought would be a lost season. (As long as the Wolves stop imitating the Mavericks before Connelly gets a crazy look in his eye the next time he sees Anthony Edwards with a beer in his hand, we’re good.)