The Timberwolves absolutely cruised through the first half of March, taking advantage of an easier schedule to go 8-0 to open the month. They seemed to be peaking at the right time and re-establishing themselves as a force in the Western Conference.
Then they hit a snag. Two Mondays ago, they lost a tough one at home to a short-handed Pacers team, who got some ridiculous shots from Obi Toppin in overtime to close out a game where Minnesota came out flat. The Wolves followed that up by dropping a clunker to Zion Williamson and a lowly Pelicans squad that came into the night with a 6-28 road record. They bounced back with a blowout win over the Zion-less Pels, but then suffered their third-worst loss of the season (by margin of defeat) on Monday in Indiana.
Having lost three of their last four games, the Wolves missed out on multiple opportunities to gain ground in a tight race with the Warriors and Clippers for the West's No. 6 seed. They're still right there, just half a game back of Golden State, but they know they need to find themselves again heading into the final nine games of the season. They have to rediscover their defensive identity, starting on Friday night against the Suns.
"Gotta get our edge back," head coach Chris Finch said on Wednesday. "I think it starts on the defensive end. On-ball competitiveness has been poor, whether it's been at the beginning (of a possession), trying to contain the ball, or at the end, just get up an influential shot contest. Those things have been missing. I think we've been looking for the easy way out, and it's just not there. We gotta get back to being the really, really good defensive team that we can be."
Through 73 games, the Wolves are tenth in offensive rating, sixth in defensive rating, and seventh in net rating. They've shown an ability to defend at a level that not many teams are capable of reaching. But in each of their last three losses, they've allowed 117-119 points in regulation and an opponent shooting percentage of at least 48.9.
With a rare three days off between Monday's loss to the Pacers and Friday's home game against Phoenix, the Wolves have focused on raising their defensive intensity in practice this week.
"We're fortunate to have a couple days of practice, so today was all defense," Finch said. "We went all the way back to the beginning, build it back up, move through our fundamentals on defense. Went live against each other, which is really a blessing at this time of the year to be able to do that. Those are the things that we have to do better, and it looked really good. The good thing is we have it in ourselves to do it. But our offense has affected our defense way too much, and that's been a come-and-go theme all season long. We gotta get over that now, once and for all."
Julius Randle said the team was shown a cut-up of recent plays where they weren't even contesting shots on the defensive end. The veteran forward said the team needs to get its "care factor" back up, and that Wednesday's practice was a high-energy session.
"Just getting our compete level up," Randle said. "Just doing the little things that matter, contesting shots, running the floor, bringing energy to the game. We got after it at practice today, and we needed that."
Maybe a bit of a wake-up call was necessary for the Wolves after winning eight in a row. The hope is that this short break in the schedule will provide a reset and get them ready to go for the final stretch of the regular season, with so much on the line in their pursuit of avoiding the play-in tournament.
"At this point in time, we know who we are, we know the recipe that works, and we've gotta stick to that," Finch said. "Both sides of the ball, there's a pathway for us to be successful, and whenever we deviate from that, it tends to bother us. And when we get bothered, we don't play well."