The Wolves start back up this week, opening up at Portland on Wednesday night. (Eds note: Nothing like a 9 p.m. tip-off on a school night to shock our sleep cycles back into NBA rhythm.) Like so much of the Chris Finch and Anthony Edwards Era of Timberwolves Basketball, fans of the team find themselves in an unprecedented frame of mind. The team is now coming off its second consecutive conference finals run, while it never in its history had consecutive seasons of even advancing one round. While there’s a whole lot of good stuff baked into this state of affairs, there are as many reasons for pause, or even legitimate concern.
This is a veteran team that returns its starting five, and 10 of its top 11 minute-getters. (Eds note: pour a little coffee out for NAW, who easily finds himself on Wolves Role Players Mount Rushmore.) With that being the case, a preview of the season ahead necessarily bases itself on the one that was just completed. For the Wolves, looking back to last year provides more of a question than an answer.
Simply put: will this be the team that finished the regular season on a 17-4 run, and then took 10 total games to advance to the conference finals? Or, instead, will it be the team that hovered around .500 for much of the year, playing a stagnant halfcourt offense, a sub-dominant and underachieving team defense, and piling up inexcusable losses against overmatched and short-handed opposition?
I wrote at last year’s regular-season finish that it was a season defined by TENSION, in a variety of different ways. In his recent interview with Britt Robson for MinnPost, Finch spoke candidly about the negative vibe that surrounded much of last season, and he did so in a manner that I think reinforces my tension definition. Finch said that it “felt like at times we were dragging our way through it all and we had to keep pulling.” He cited the incorporation of new players, the inexcusable losses, and the contract situations of multiple key guys that culminated in “a moodiness about us, which was not always a pleasant place to come to work everyday.”
Of course, the vibes flipped when the team started winning almost every game to close out the season, and especially so when they ripped off a pair of convincing playoff-series wins over star-studded Lakers and Warriors opponents. Exacting revenge on both Luka and Jimmy in one playoffs was more SATISFYING than the eventual pulverizing defeat to OKC was DISCOURAGING. That said, the OKC beatdown was lopsided enough that the team could enter the offseason safe in its understanding that it was not a true championship contender. Not yet.
What should be expected next?
To be the optimist would of course begin by rehashing that late-season and postseason success, and beat your listener over the head with the word CONTINUITY. The last time Finch had a strong roster with continuity was Year 2 of Rudy & KAT Twin Towers, which was his best team he’s had here, and one of the two best in Wolves franchise history. That team jumped out of the gates to a 20-5 record, and rode the league’s best defense to season-long credible title contention. It is easy to forget how disappointing the year before that one was, when the two-bigs concept looked totally unworkable and the team was probably at its best when KAT was out and Kyle Anderson was in his spot. That they ran it back after that dissapointment, and were immediately so dominant, was unexpected. What it seemed to suggest was that Finch can slow-cook team chemistry even as us spastic pundits are smashing the panic button throughout a disappointing stretch of games. If the trend holds once again, and continuity reaps benefits, this year’s Wolves team figures to be better than last season’s, and might again be in the conversation of championship hopes and contention.
The pessimist has a case, too, however, and it is relatively straightforward. Last year’s Wolves might have suffered less from vibes and chemistry, and more because of Father Time, and the depreciation of Rudy Gobert and especially Mike Conley. When the ’23-24 team was humming, Rudy was winning his fourth DPOY and Conley was proving his acquisition to be arguably the greatest trade in team history. Last year, however, Conley was worse. He was dinged up, but he was also older. He just turned 38. Finch’s affection disparity between Mike and his ostensible replacement, Rob Dillingham, could hardly be more stark, and we can absolutely expect Conley to be the team’s starting point guard for as long as he isn’t injured. When he’s out, it isn’t clear that Finch would replace him with Rob – if Vegas allowed bets on the subject, I assume Donte would be the favorite as point-guard alternative within the current roster. Without a steady and dynamic-enough point guard, Finch’s offense seems to stall rather dramatically. And when the offense stalls, the opposing defense has energy in reserve to push it the other way and compromise what should be a top-tier Wolves defense. Even more than most teams, I think the Wolves offensive execution links to their defensive dominance. (Remember when the dominant Celtics defenses would have KG at the top of the key on offense as “first man back” on defense? That type of structure is a good example of how the two sides can be interrelated, and when Ant is dribbling off his foot against a crowded and unscrambled half-court defense, there is no Rudy Gobert defense back and set, on the other end.)
I don’t know if continuity will bring about a smoother halfcourt execution than we saw for much of last season. I don’t trust preseason games to be any sort of a test of this type of broad issue. But if the Wolves disappoint this season, it will probably be at least in part due to the point guard position, with Mike not having the jets to play the way he knows he needs to, and the team not having any viable alternatives; or, as the Twitter Community might argue, the coach not being willing to trust Rob Dillingham.
These are broad strokes: continuity and chemistry versus aging and offensive execution. There’s plenty of minutiae that could be chewed on ad nauseum.
Ant says he’s got a post game, will he “make a leap?” Will he ultimately have a Tier 1 Superstar offensive package? Some might argue he should focus more on defensive consistency. Is it realistic in the modern NBA to dominate on both ends of the floor? (I would argue “Not really.”)
Jaylen Clark’s defense might be one of the team’s elite factors. Can Finch afford to NOT play him in the regular rotation?
Finch seems to like Terrence Shannon Jr. a lot, can he earn a regular spot and be more than a “change-of-pace energy guy?”
Will Finch’s rotation be consistent, or might there be some night-to-night variety?
And, forever and always: should Naz Reid start over Julius Randle?
Starting Wednesday night, we’ll receive answers to these questions and more.
I’m predicting 50 wins and 32 losses, slightly bullish in the belief that continuity matters quite a lot for this team and its coach’s approach.
Go Wolves.
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