“This team will flip the switch in the playoffs”.
The infamous switch! The magical, mythical thing that was supposed to exist for the Minnesota Timberwolves to grab ahold of, completely change who they are and become a team much closer to their two years ago-selves on the floor when the games mattered more.
WRONG!
If the indescribable, exhilarating mile high win on Monday night told me anything, it was the fact that this switch was just an idea all along. It doesn’t exist. It never did exist. It was a trojan
horse to excuse the bipolar nature of a team that saw jaw-dropping lows followed shortly by some of the best regular season (and now playoff) moments this franchise has ever seen.
All of that is ok. It’s who they are, and for better or for worse what they are going to be for the remainder of this season. On Monday night, it was certainly for better.
How Much is Too Much?
Throughout the season, every player on the roster alluded in some capacity to how the team identity has procrastination and “winning time” baked into it. Prone to slow starts, letting leads slip, and poor stretches of effort over the last two seasons, a Western Conference Finals appearance last year quickly had many people forgetting about just how inconsistent the Wolves are prone to be throughout the course of an 82 game season.
With continuity being the message heading in, a pattern emulating 2023-24 was expected; a methodical, dominant season after a turbulent prior year that had a new group trying to figure each other out.
As we all know, it didn’t happen. In fact, throughout the season, it felt as though a group branded as continuous tried to test that label and see just how far they could extend their margin of error before holding onto a win or coming back to achieve one.
Enter Monday night.
Just how all-over-the-board did things get?
The Wolves wrapped the first quarter with a -53.8 net rating. Rudy Gobert had the worst of the bunch with a -68. A disaster start that looked like it would culminate in an early exit for the Wolves.
What happened in the very next quarter? You guessed it. a 53.8 net rating, with Gobert leading the way at a 96.7.
They would go on in ostentatious fashion to extend the numbers on paper to a thrilling win in game two. Donte DiVincenzo led the way from a net rating standpoint in the second half, and Gobert would go on to play his now-famous defense on Jokic to seal the deal.
But given time to reflect on a win that wasn’t going to let anyone come back down to earth anytime immediately after, it made me wonder just how continuously close this Wolves team can get to the edge before it does them in.
In a series with Oklahoma City, this level of variance would not get you far. Hell, we’ll see how far it gets them in a series with Denver. We’re two games in and a great win only goes as far as the next game.
But the “switch” of consistently disciplined basketball that we were all waiting for simply doesn’t exist. In a more intermittent fashion that flips on and off three or four times a game? Sure. I’ll give you that.
But we also have a new factor coming into play.
Throughout the pre and postgame media sessions in games one and two, there seems to be a touch of moxie percolating throughout the team. Living in ambivalence and shrugging their shoulders for much of the season when asked to explain why so many ebbs and flows occurred, it became mind-numbing at points to ask the same questions and see the same results.
But especially Monday? Rudy Gobert puffed his chest out at his Defensive Player of the Year snub, Chris Finch took aim at the entire institution of NBA officiating, and Jaden McDaniels capped it all off with one of the bigger mic drop moments this team has ever produced after a win.
How will something like that look in the long run? Only time will tell.
But more so than an on-court switch being flipped, it’s fair to say that there very well could be an attitude switch being flipped on this team. Denver likely brings this side out of them as one of the best rivalries in the league over the last 10 years. I think the Thunder also bring this side out of them – look no further than Chris Finch’s December ejection and myriad of trash talk aimed at Shai Gilgeous-Alexander from Anthony Edwards.
Finch raved about in-huddle leadership and togetherness of the team on Monday. Donte DiVincenzo backed everyone up in the locker room, calling Gobert “our Defensive Player of the Year” and Anthony Edwards “Our MVP”. 84 games in, a sudden tone shift in approach looked to be taking shape.
A…switch you could call it?
Perhaps the one being flipped after all when things have started to hit the fan isn’t immediately one that’s reflected on the floor, but one in the locker room. Right now, trying to separate from being a prisoner in the moment, it does feel a little different. There does seem to be a wave of nastiness setting in with this team.
Will the one on the floor come next, or will the intangible tone switch fade in and out like the tangible on-court one did for much of the regular season?
Let’s find out.
