A dinged up and dysfunctional Minnesota Timberwolves let the first game of their playoff series with the Denver Nuggets slip away Saturday afternoon, erasing a stupendous start with some second quarter slippage and then a horrible third quarter that was a textbook example of the steadfast immaturity that has afflicted this team like a stubborn virus over the course of the 2025-26 season.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Let\u2019s begin at the beginning, where the good stuff stirred belief that a week\u2019s preparation had the underdog Wolves primed to snatch home-court advantage with a Game One ambush.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Denver\u2019s Big Three of Nikola Jokic, Jamal Murray and Aaron Gordon had zero field goals after nearly seven minutes of play. Over that span, four-time defensive player of the year Rudy Gobert clamped down three-time most valuable player of the year Jokic, who averaged a triple-double this season, to the statistical trickle of one rebound, one assist, zero points and three turnovers.\u00a0<\/p>\n
At the other end of the court, the Wolves were shrewdly taking what the Nuggets defense was giving them, which was mostly free rein for players other than Anthony Edwards and Julius Randle. Donte \u201cRagu\u201d DiVincenzo scored the team\u2019s first six points off dimes from Gobert and Ant within the first 90 seconds, then Jaden McDaniels delivered 10 of the next 12, mostly through aggressive baseline drives that yielded layups and Denver fouls.\u00a0<\/p>\n
For three minutes midway through the first quarter, the Wolves dictated the terms of the game, generating three steals and outscoring the Nuggets 11-3 via two transition dunks, an Ant step-back three-pointer and finger-roll layup and an Ant feed to a cutting Gobert for a third dunk in that span. It was 27-15 and Denver called time.\u00a0<\/p>\n
After the first period the lead was still double digits, 33-23, but the Nuggets gnawed half of that away in the opening minutes of the second period. The gap held until the midpoint of the quarter when Randle proceeded to lead the way in sabotaging the Wolves offense.\u00a0<\/p>\n
After being forced to the bench with two fouls within the game\u2019s first five minutes, he came in for his second rotation at the 8:42 mark of the second quarter, he used a Gobert screen to dribble left, where he was picked up by seven-footer Jonas Valanciunas. Ignoring an Ayo Dosunmu open for a three-pointer in the right slot, he pulled up for a long midrange, a 17-footer that caromed off the back iron. Even so, an excusable attempt to work himself into a rhythm after an atypically long stint sitting.\u00a0<\/p>\n
A minute later, a layup that hit off the side of the rim fell into his hands for a rebound and he quickly dribbled up the court, encountering the smaller Tim Hardaway, Jr. in the low left block. Again, a trio of teammates were open for three-pointers but a Randle spin move drew the foul and he canned both free throws. Fair enough.<\/p>\n
But then Randle upped the ante. Receiving a pass from Ant out on the perimeter, he put Jokic on roller skates with an upfake, a deked drive and finally a wide-open step-back trey from 26 feet that was offline and short, clanking the front iron. The very next offensive possession he took a perimeter pass from Ragu. Granted there were only 5 seconds on the shot clock. But he was closely guarded, to the point where he leaned forward and put his head into the chest of the Nuggets Cam Johnson. Options were available \u2014 McDaniels to his right, Ragu to his left \u2014 but after the forehead push he elected to extend an arm while stepping back and launched a well-contested three-pointer that clanked again.\u00a0<\/p>\n
A total of 161 players made at least 82 three-pointers this season and thus are listed in official accuracy numbers from long range \u2014 the standard is a make for every game on the schedule.\u00a0 Randle ranks 159th among those 161 players at 31.5% from behind the arc, well below the league average of 36%.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Randle\u2019s next shot after those wayward threes was two-and-a-half minutes later \u2014 a\u00a0 tough, successful, turnaround hook shot in traffic that is more his style. But the possession right after that, just 13 seconds after the Nuggets had scored, there he was again, clanking a step-back trey from 25 feet.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Ten seconds later, with 1:54 left in the half, Finch removed him from the game. The Wolves scored on their final four possessions. McDaniels hit a cutting Gobert for a layup, then Ant bestowed three dimes: To McDaniels driving for a reverse layup; to Ragu for three-pointer; and then Gobert for another driving layup.\u00a0<\/p>\n
On balance, the first half featured a successful offense. The Wolves shot 53.5% from the field, 43.8% from deep and 81.8% from the foul line in generating 63 points.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Then it fell apart. The pack mentality on play creation disappeared for the Wolves. The three precepts of offensive continuity \u2014 move the ball, move without the ball, make quick decisions \u2014 disintegrated into stagnant, stupid, selfish hoops.\u00a0<\/p>\n
In the first eight minutes of the third quarter, the team made two of eighteen shots, one of seven from long range, and got to the free throw line twice, making one. Six points. Meanwhile, the Nuggets scored 20 and that halftime tie became an 82-68 disadvantage. The Wolves offense straightened out some from that point forward.<\/p>\n
On Sunday afternoon after the team\u2019s game-one film session, Mike Conley was made available to the media and I asked him why this team can go from classically beautiful basketball to blatant ineptitude so abruptly.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cI wish I had the answer, then we wouldn\u2019t be doing it,\u201d he replied. \u201cI think it becomes part of the game where at some point you want to get your shots; you know, \u2018We\u2019re up, everybody\u2019s rolling, the defense will play us differently now.\u2019 But they don\u2019t play you differently. The team (opponent) will play exactly the same way and we\u2019ve got to continue to make the right read and the right play.<\/p>\n
\u201cI say it all the time,\u201d Conley continued. \u201cIf we make the right play every time we can\u2019t be beat. Denver is forcing you into a certain way of playing and you either play that way or you don\u2019t. You have to adjust to that and then do it for four quarters, not just when it is convenient. It is about winning; at the end of the day we have to do it.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n