The Timberwolves will be the 6th seed in the Western Conference
The Timberwolves will be the 6th seed in the Western Conference because they are 47-33. They can’t pass the Lakers or Rockets, who are 50-29 but can’t be below the Suns who are 43-36.
Nuggets Wolves round 1. Wolves matchup well with the Nugs, but I think KAT was a big part of that. If the Nugs can’t get past the Wolves, they don’t deserve to play OKC or SAS
KAT and NAW were both important to the matchup against us before. Plus they’ve had their own share of injuries though looks like Jaden was back today at least. They didn’t have Ayo when we played them this season IIRC so interesting to see how he impacts the matchup.
Ayo can kinda replicate what NAW did from a defensive POA standpoint, and he’s sort the 3 ball better this year… Issue is Joker loves cooking Rudy
Ayo replacing NAW for being one of the defenders going after Murray is why I mentioned him. Curious how he handles it if Nuggets are healthy for the series to spread the Wolves out. Will they try playing Naz and Gobert together to replicate KAT + Gobert from 2024?
Possibly. Or they may just tell Kyle Anderson to foul him
I remember in 22-23, when KAT was out they’d use Slomo to take on Jokic which would allow Rudy to roam. Slomo is good at those poke steals and he had a lot of those in the 23-24 series. I can also see Gobert and Naz together sometimes too.
Naz will get absolutely cooked they’re better off letting Rudy get shredded and playing everyone else straight up.
Ayo was there for the last game but that was just an awful game from us, no chemistry and I think Gordon was still out.
Did Ayo come off the bench? I thought I checked the box score and didn’t notice him.
Yeah he came off the bench and dropped 9. Safe to say he’s settled in a bit more since though.
Okay so I missed him among the bench players, makes way more sense. Game was too long ago to remember well who played for my old ass :P
Yeah dw lol, I only know it cause it came up when I was talking about the matchup on our sub
Not feeling confident they’ll suddenly get everything to click. Injuries hit at the wrong time & just been too inconsistent.
Players just got an extended rest and will come back healthy. People are really blowing up the injuries. This is not a Luka and Reaves situation. Reporters said Ant is resting but cleared to come back and will likely be back before the season ends.
I mean, the Wolves are 5-3 against the Nuggets since the KAT trade.
Not saying that KAT wasn’t important or that the Wolves would be favored. Just pushing back on the idea that his absence totally changes everything.
Honestly, both teams are meaningfully different than they were in the WCSF 2 years ago. Minnesota lost KAT/NAW/sort of Mike, but added Julius/Donte/Ayo.
Denver lost MPJ but added Cam Johnson, Valanciunas, Bruce Brown, THJ, and sort of Peyton Watson (he was barely in the rotation back then).
Not much to glean from the season matchups, Ant missed some, Gordon and Watson missed some, and the Wolves probably made the bigger trade deadline acquisition between the two teams.
However, looking at some of the lineup data the Nuggets feasted when Gordon was available and the Wolves only really made up ground while Valanciunas was on the floor which, if its a close game in the playoffs, may only be a handful of minutes.
Hell, Ant hasn’t even returned. As of now Denver shouldn’t have any worries.
Ant is back and will play before the regular season is over. He will have a full week of proper rest instead of injury recovery before the playoffs.
glad we get this series again 🍿
We don’t match up well with the Nuggets anymore, ever since we shipped KAT off. KAT was that important to our Jokic defense. Now, Jokic just eats us up every time. I honestly don’t expect to get out of the first round if we get the Nuggets.
The plan is always let Joker eat and limit Murray and others. Remember the heat pack?
Wolves are 5-3 since the KAT trade and have missed Ant for 1 of those losses.
A big part of that is the nuggets can’t really guard Ant unless they send a crazy amount of help but now that Ant is injured apparently it makes it a lot easier for the nuggets.
Ant is cleared by doctors and Jon K (our beat reporter) said the team is enthusiastic and he will be back by the end of the season.
This is not a Luka and Reaves situation. He is just resting now and is coming back either next game or April 12 to get back in rhythm. They will be fresh come playoffs.
That’s good to hear
Yeah KAT was a big part of the matchups but they did fine vs Denver last year without KAT. This year, we didn’t get any games where both teams were healthy so it’s hard to glean much.
It will be a tough and fire matchup. I cannot wait. Jaden is back and looks great. Ant is cleared by doctors and will be back. Both teams know each other very very well. They must be sick of playing each other haha
It’s going to be peak, entertaining hoops!
Wolves fan chiming in, Nuggets are going to obliterate us
Stop that, we’ll be alright. People are really writing off the Wolves because they were unhealthy these past few games. They will be healthy come playoffs. Jaden is already back and Ant is coming back before the season ends. We know the Nuggets very very well so they don’t have to start from scratch in the gameplan. Nuggets have a bad to mediocre defense too, Ant will slice through it
I’ve watched the Wolves long enough for a general idea of what’s coming. Even healthy our team wasn’t gelling all season. We’d go on a good 5 game stretch and play terrible. That was the peak for this year, and it happened a couple times.
Did you not watch the Wolves the past few years in the playoffs? This is about matchups. Denver is tough because they have more depth now but to act like we’ll be obliterated is just disrespectful to the Wolves. We still have a lot of strategies against them. Jaden is back and Ant will be back. I think we are a better team than last year.
At this time last year, we were the 8th seed battling the last week and we got the 6th seed on the last day. We had a cakewalk schedule to end the season and were healthy so we had a win streak. This year, Ant was out for a quarter of the season but we were a playoff team all year.
It will be tough but give the Wolves some respect, cmon. They’ve shown they can play in the playoffs the last few years.
I hope you’re right, but I’m not holding my breath. My expectations are a 1st round bounce in 5 or 6.
If Minnesota is healthy (big if) then neither team can guard the other, similar to how it is when Denver and LAL play each other.
Denver is more vulnerable than people realize because of how terrible their defense is. We’ll see if Minnesota is healthy enough to make this a 6 or 7 game series.
It’s gonna come down to Randle/McDaniels vs AG. Murray Jokic and Ant gonna be solid.
Ant is cleared already and resting. Reporters said he’ll be back next game or the game after. I like that our players are rested and will be fresh come playoffs.
This is not a Luka and Reaves situation. Jaden is rested and came back today. Dropped 18 on 50% shooting in 19 min. Wolves will be healthy come playoffs.
I’ll believe it when I see it with Ant. It’s not at all clear whether he’ll be 100% by game 1. And isn’t Naz Reid playing injured too?
Naz is banged up and playing injured in the way most NBA players are playing through injury and banged up at the end of the season. His shooting was off initially after banging up his shoulder but he looks back in form now. I suspect he’ll be resting the last 2 games or playing low minutes to get fresh.
Based on our beat reporters (Jon K), they just wrote articles about how the team is optimistic and doctors have cleared everyone. People are really making this a bigger deal than it is. Health is not a big if, they are literally all cleared to play.
Similar to how they play LAL?
They’re 8-1 against LAL in the last 2 playoffs?
Pretty mediocre to disappointing season if we’re being honest
They desperately need a good true PG
i would say pretty disappointing cause they’ve been one of the healthiest teams in the league
They absolutely play CTE basketball so often it’s crazy.
i wonder how much of it can be chalked up to coaching, or if they have just assembled a really dumb core group of players lol
Bit of both. The team is incredibly stupid but Finch has no idea how to get a consistent effort level from them. They play hard when they want to, and this group has gotten up for playoff games, which is good. But they’re stuck in the 6th seed because they barely gave any effort in a lot of games this season against shitty opponents.
yeah they’ve been a mind boggling watch all year
can’t imagine how it feels watching them every game as a fan
Then how did you guys get the three seed a couple of years ago
Everyone on the team was blessed with the sacred waters of Lake Minnetonka, on the grounds of Paisley Park.
Everyone; from the players to the towel boys to the receptionists and even the volunteers who works the concession stands.
top defense in the league that year
Both, Finch caters too much and while individually Randle, Naz, Jaden, and Ant are all really good to great players they feed off of each other far too often. And if one of them is off and lazy it brings them all down. Finch doesn’t do too much about it.
Honestly it makes me feel less crazy when I see fans of other teams say the Wolves play some of the dumbest basketball.
doesn’t help that Gobert loves bitching about his touches yet dude is in year 13 without a single post move, terrible hands at catching the ball, no touch outside of 1 foot and can’t bully smaller guards on switches
Rudy gets to bitch because while he cant make a layup, he’s also covering for Donte, Randle, Ant and Naz routinely blowing their assignments on defense.
While they were super healthy early and played like dogshit while fairly healthy, they’ve had some pretty rough injury luck of late in a pretty crucial stretch of the season.
Like, they’ve been missing Jaden AND Ant (and Ayo for a few games) and had Naz playing hurt the past 7 or so games and lost 5 of them against teams that are good enough to beat you at half-strength but the Wolves probably beat if healthy. When the Wolves were just missing Ant, they were holding their own, but as soon as they were down 2 of their 3-4 best players it started to snowball.
Too, Ant’s easily their best player, and he’ll miss more games than the best player on any of the teams above them in the Western Conference standings.
Yeah Ant played 60 games which is missing a quarter of the season. What did people expect?
Wolves actually performed where I thought they would coming in this year.
I anticipated some risk because we’re relying on younger, unknown guys like Bones and had to check out Dilly and TSJ because NAW is gone and Conley regressed. Whenever you’re relying on and experimenting with youth, there’s going to be up and downs. Then Ant missed a fourth of the season. Yet they were in a better position throughout the season vs last year.
Ant missed a fourth of the season…he’s our best player, and he’ll miss more games than the best player on any of the teams above them in the Western Conference standings.
unquestionably
if they don’t tear it up in the playoffs it is time to make some tweaks to the formula
I like Chris Finch and I think he’s a good coach but the way the whole team is constantly coasting every time they think they can get away with it has been a problem for years and that feels like a coaching problem
Idk, I think Finch deserves a lot of credit for figuring out the Randle Gobert fit mid season last year and the KAT Gobert fit the season before. Not to mention back to back WCF. I doubt you guys find someone better to replace him.
I think what y’all really need is a true PG and for Anthony Edwards to mature as a team leader. Not that Ants immature, just that he’s literally 24 and I expect he’ll start taking on more responsibility in terms of keeping his team focused and motivated as he gets older.
I 100% agree. Finch feels like a good coach that will have your team in the playoffs, but gets out-coached when it matters most. The complacency like you said is alarming too.
A good true PG is not what the Wolves need. Ant has the ball more anyway and true PGs just end up playing off-ball next to Ant (Conley from the very beginning played a lot off-ball). Wolves play PG by committee and Ant just needs secondary ball-handlers, not a PG.
I think Ayo Dosunmo was the perfect acquisition. A guard who can defend, score, push pace in transition and be a secondary ball handler. The bigger issue is the lack of rebounding, size and defense in the non-Rudy minutes, not lack of a true PG.
I thought the Wolves did fine given Ant missed a fourth of the season. No other Western conference team ahead of them had their best player missing as much as Ant.
They had under a +3 net rating per 100 with him on the court. It’s not like they were doing amazing when he was playing
Net rating is a team stat + small sample size. Watch some games and you’ll see he’s obviously a great addition.
Y’all trashing the wolves, but if you ask denver I’m sure they’d rather play the Lakers or the rockets in the first round.
lakers are barely an nba team rn
obviously
Never feel comfortable against the wolves. The double OT game we lost last year against y’all with a Jokic 61 point triple double still lives rent free.
I still have that on my dvr
Your whole starting roster could be injured and I still wouldn’t wanna face you guys.
Anyone would. Lakers are a hospital ward and the Rockets’ vibe is completely off
Correct
I’m sure they’d rather play the Kings too
The Lakers and rockets are 4⁄5 seed.
The kings aren’t relevant
Pretty nice to be in the play-offs back to back to back to back to back.
I dream of days like these.
This what Pat Bev lives for
Those next 5 years were sooooooo his
Somehow the Wolves are the best MN men’s sports team of the 2020’s. It is a shock to us all.
And yet they will still somehow end up in the western conference finals
They got a lot tougher of a road to the WCF this year. Last year the arguable 3 best teams in the west ended up opposite to them
Thunder, Nuggets and Clippers… I kinda agree
Lol can’t believe people are saying the Wolves are rated to be in the WCF again for the 3rd time running. What is this LIFE !?!‽
And we’re likely to end up as the 3rd seed… fuck it we ball
Nuggets likely having to play Minnesota, San Antonio and then OKC to reach the finals is so brutal.
Might as well pencil in OKC for the WCF at this point
Weak loser mentality right here.
💯 Denver vs Detroit finals - heard it here first.
Wolves are an easy win for the Nuggets, you should be happy. They don’t have any cohesion at the moment.
No chance at the lottery, sad
cool pick swap, opposite of sad
Excellent news Pistons fans
Top 6 is pretty much set in stone.. only thing that could flip is houston/la for the 4⁄5, but either wya those matchups are set in stone.
Right where we love it, in that 3⁄6 seed for the third year in a row.
Worked out for them last time
Everyone needs to keep writing the Wolves off. Wolves are a moody team who have openly admitted that they play better when doubted and worse when favored 😂
Jaden is back. Ant is already cleared and coming back next game or the game after. They are rested and will be healthy come playoffs. Keep writing them off, please! They need the bulletin board material.
Going to be a fun series vs Denver. Need to prep for the heart attack inducing 61 point Jokic triple doubles, Ant 44 points, 2 OT games…
Lakers in 5
This is the way
Hoping for them to be a dark horse in the west !
Lotta bad losses to close out the season, overall feeling like a bit of a downer of a year. And now, barring a miracle in LA they’ve earned themselves a first round matchup against the Nuggets.
Looking like it might be a short season in Minnesota.
They were missing Ant and Jaden - what did people expect? They were the 3 seed right before that.
Wolves will be healthy come playoffs. It will be a tough matchup but I wouldn’t write them off that easily
Damn AG hurt again?
Wolves are going to sweep