After being outmuscled and outplayed in a loss that put them behind 2-0 in their best-of-seven conference final against Oklahoma City, Timberwolves players couldn’t help but convey their frustration with the other team’s defensive aggression.
“They’re hacking.”
No, those exact words weren’t spoken by any Timberwolves player, or by coach Chris Finch following Minnesota’s loss on Thursday at Paycom Center. That was Nuggets forward Aaron Gordon in the aftermath of Minnesota’s 106-80 victory in Game 2 of the 2024 Western Conference semifinals.
The Nuggets became consumed by their frustration with the officiating and what they felt the Wolves' defense was getting away with. Then-Denver coach Michael Malone went nose to nose in a yelling match with referee Marc Davis. Jamal Murray threw a heat pack onto the court. The Nuggets came unglued.
Murray left the locker room without speaking to reporters that evening, much like Anthony Edwards did Thursday in Oklahoma City.
Suddenly, the defending champs were heading to Minneapolis with the possibility of getting swept out of the playoffs squarely in play. Frankly, that was the assumed result at that point. The Nuggets were getting punked. It was a realization Gordon seemed to strike by the end of his post-Game 2 comments.
“I feel like we’re getting pushed off our spots; they were grabbing and holding, and we were looking for the officials,” he said. “We weren’t doing anything about it.”
Rather than praying for a life preserver from the referees, Denver decided to fight back. The Nuggets upped their physicality to match and even exceed Minnesota’s. Denver committed 25 fouls in a Game 3 trouncing of the Timberwolves as they bogged down Minnesota’s offense with its tenacity at Target Center.
The Nuggets won three straight games to take a series lead before eventually running out of gas and falling to the Wolves in seven games. But at least the champs went out on their swords.
A year later, Minnesota finds itself on the other side of the coin. The Wolves are now down 2-0 after consecutive blowout road losses. They’re the ones who feel the referees are swallowing their whistles.
“They’re just handsy, man,” Wolves forward Julius Randle said Thursday. “There’s a lot of swipes, all that different type of stuff.”
“There’s a lot of things that are not going to get called,” Wolves center Rudy Gobert said between Games 1 and 2. “They are relentless. We knew that. We know that they’re grabbing, fouling, but we know that we’re not going to get all those calls.”
Waiting for the whistles isn’t a winning strategy. Oklahoma City has been the aggressor through two games. If that doesn’t change in the Twin Cities, these West Finals will be over sooner rather than later.
For the better part of the past two seasons, Minnesota has been the big, fast, strong team that wears opponents down with its physicality and tenacity. But through two games, the Wolves have met their match in Oklahoma City. And rather than the matchup producing a high-stakes showdown of two teams out for blood, the Wolves have too frequently cowered into the corner.
They would likely maintain that they haven’t been allowed to play a physical brand of defense because of the whistle afforded to newly crowned MVP Shai Gilgeous-Alexander. But the reality is those sometimes questionable foul calls aren’t coming on plays where Minnesota is out harassing the Thunder’s star guard on the perimeter.
Because that scenario has not played out. Gilgeous-Alexander is getting where he wants to go on the floor and bringing the contact to Minnesota’s defenders. As is often the case in basketball, the guy forcing the action is getting the call.
Throughout his tenure, Timberwolves coach Chris Finch has frequently mentioned the need for his team to maintain a “hit-first mentality” on the court. In this series, it has looked more like, “Get hit, and immediately look at the official.”
That’s a great formula if your goal is to go on vacation, and it’s simply not who Minnesota has been for the past few years. It’s difficult to imagine the Wolves going out this tamely. But that’s what will happen if change isn’t made ahead of Saturday’s Game 3 at Target Center.
They need to be the ones setting the tone. They need to be physical, to deliver the hits, to dictate the terms of the game.
They need to be themselves.
Or, more apt to this situation, they need to be last year’s Nuggets. They have two options: Show some championship-caliber fight, or risk finding themselves watching the Thunder hoist a trophy on the Target Center floor, much like they did with Dallas in this very round last season.
“It will be a huge disappointment,” Wolves guard Nickeil Alexander-Walker said, “if we don’t bring that competitiveness to try to win.”
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