A year ago, at the conclusion of the 2025 Western Conference finals, Wolves guard Anthony Edwards marveled at the connectivity of Oklahoma City’s defense, noting it was five guys playing “on a string.”
A year later, Minnesota was done in by a very similar level of execution on that end, performed by a different opponent. San Antonio — a team flush with players in their early 20s — was ultra sharp with its rotations and gameplan discipline.
It’s no mistake the Spurs and Thunder will now square off in the West finals, which start Sunday in Oklahoma. They’re playing the sport at the highest possible level at the moment. Not only due to their talent, but the way the talent works consistently works together to achieve a team result, even under duress.
Which begs the question: Why isn’t that the Wolves? Minnesota may not have a perfectly blended roster, but it has oodles of playoff experience and a deep, fairly talented roster led by a top 10 player in the world in Anthony Edwards.
Edwards was asked how Minnesota can evolve into that team that’s playing “on a string.”
“We’ve just got to listen to the coaches,” he said. “We had a hard time with like processing stuff and going out there and doing it, trying to do stuff on our own. I think that’s our problem.”
The issue is the Wolves are always trying to process on the fly come the playoffs. The Spurs and Thunder are hardwired to execute by now, thanks to the coding inputted during the regular season. Minnesota? Not so much.
“I feel like you’re supposed to build championship habits in the regular season,” Edwards said. “We didn’t build habits during the regular season.”
Much to the chagrin of Wolves coach Chris Finch and veterans such as Mike Conley and Rudy Gobert. Throughout the 82-game slate, they all lamented the team’s inconsistent performance. But Finch was routinely told by his players not to worry. Players commented multiple times that they were simply “bored” with the regular season and that, when playoff time arrived, they’d turn the dial.
But it doesn’t work that way. Maybe it can suffice for a round or two, as it did against a Denver squad Minnesota physically dominated. But the Spurs were a physical match. Which meant the series would be determined by the details. San Antonio dominated those. The Spurs executed their defensive gameplan. They gang rebounded. They ran in transition with relentless aggression.
Every advantage they possessed, they picked at again and again.
Minnesota simply cannot do that. It’s a matter of discipline, one that’s done the Wolves in twice in as many seasons. Attention to detail, not getting bored with success, these are attributes of champions, but none the Wolves display on a regular basis.
“I think that’s on us, it’s on me. We’ve got to meet these standards better. I think it all comes down to discipline right now,” Finch said. “Whether you’re undermanned or have matchup issues or whatever it might be in the playoffs, the discipline to execute what you need to do is way more important in the playoffs. At times, our discipline came and went. It was the same thing against Oklahoma City.
“We feel pretty comfortable, we know where we’re going to get our shots. We just have to be more disciplined to keep making the plays that are going to lead to getting those shots. That’s something that we don’t consistently do. This series was not too different. I thought, as the series was unfolding, if we go down, we’re going to go down for the same reasons we did a year ago.”
It has to be corrected moving forward.
Gobert said the Wolves are talented and resilient. But they need to determine their foundation and build it over the course of six-plus months if it’s going to hold up under the high-pressure postseason environment.
“That’s something that I’ve felt very strongly about in my time with any team that I’ve been around, is the habits that we’ve built throughout a season, they matter so much,” Conley said. “I think that for guys that are younger, they might not understand that in the moment, but it shows up. It shows up when you need it most, when you need to make that extra play with two seconds left in the game or to go crash for the rebound, even when you’re tired, or getting back on defense, spacing the floor for your teammates, sacrifice runs, all that stuff.”
Finch despised the notion of “flipping a switch” come playoff time, yet it became Minnesota’s last hope for postseason success after an uninspiring regular season. Sure enough, for the second straight year, the Wolves surprised as a No. 6 seed in Round 1 after a 49-win campaign.
But when it comes time to punch at or above your weight class is when you need those habits most. Minnesota didn’t have any good ones to fall back on. The Wolves couldn’t suddenly start running back on defense or become more intentional and selfless with their offensive spacing when they hadn’t prioritized such things on an individual level all season.
“It’s something that you just don’t flip a switch for. It’s something that you have or want to do from training camp on and it just becomes a part of you,” Conley said. “I think those are things we battled back and forth throughout the year. When we did it, we were able to beat teams. We were able to play at the highest levels. We were able to look like the team we were capable of being. And there’d be times we just weren’t doing that consistently. And there’s just no place for that inconsistency when you’re trying to compete for a championship.”
Related Articles
-
Frederick: Does this formula work? Timberwolves don’t have look of title contender
-
For third straight year, Timberwolves season ends in blowout defeat
-
Which end of bench Timberwolves could contribute in next year’s rotation?
-
Is Game 6 the Timberwolves’ last stand? ‘There’s no one in this group that is a quitter’
-
Championship-caliber execution isn’t robotic for Timberwolves. They must find it to survive.
