With a day of rest and the comforts of home, the Minnesota Timberwolves take on the fading specter of the Golden State Warriors. This mid-week game will be their third in four days, with another back-to-back to start Halloween weekend. Still smarting from their first loss of the season at the hands of the Cleveland Cavaliers, the Wolves will look to get back on the correct side of the win/loss column.
Game Info
- Who: Minnesota Timberwolves (3-1) vs. Golden State Warriors(1-3)
- When: Wednesday, October 28 at 7:00 PM CT
- Where: Target Center – Minneapolis, MN
- Local TV: DAZN-MN, Kare 11
- Radio: 830 WCCO
Numbers on the Board
Minnesota continues to shoot below 70% from the charity stripe. Their second efforts to gather rebounds
and run in transition like children bounding to the house that is giving out king-size candy bars might be sapping some of the energy from their legs.
The big highlight plays that fill up our timelines are fun and feel big and important. They can demoralize an opponent and lead to 20-point blowouts. And yet, leaving points on the board will come back to haunt the Wolves when they pour out their plastic pumpkin and find the weight of their haul misleading.
It’s the points here and there, the KitKat minis that fill in the spaces that will sustain the sugar rush.
The Wolves committed 42 turnovers combined in their back-to-back bouts. Their uptempo and loose play style will naturally lead to the ball flying around – sometimes errantly, sometimes snatched by a defender hiding just out of sight.
During the Golden State Warriors’ dynastic run, they were consistently in the top ten for average turnovers per game. The cost of creating havoc for defenses is that sometimes the havoc pulls you in.
All that said, there is at least one space that should be easier to clean up. The guards need to be better about how they give Rudy the ball in the post. He is not a player who can regularly catch it cleanly in traffic anywhere beneath his head. When he does get the ball at his chest while under the basket, he regularly puts his Ricky Bobby costume on and gives it away.
On the positive side of things, TJ Shannon Jr. is off to a roaring start of the season. He has more than doubled his average points per game and is currently shooting 50% on five attempts from beyond the arc. I don’t foresee the three-point percentage holding, but if he can stick in the upper 30s with the same shot frequency, he will have that much more space for his preferred method…
Attacking the Rim
These Warriors are small. 6’6 Draymond Green is their starting center, while Al Horford at 6’8 is their backup. Both players are near the tail end of their careers, and neither is the tallest available player on the team. That honorific goes to Malevy Leons, who has seen roughly ten whole minutes of floor time this season. Kristaps Porziņģis is out indefinitely due to a chronic illness.
The Wolves attacking the basket or snagging offensive rebounds for putbacks is a recipe they should be able to go to again and again.
Jonathan Kuminga has also been thoroughly impressive in his start with the Wolves.
If the stories about infighting between JK and Warriors coach Steve Kerr are true, then this game will be a real test for Kuminga’s focus and consistency. He has the size and athleticism to make the Warriors pay on both ends of the floor, but it will serve him and his team best if he does so in the flow of the game and not looking to prove a point.
In his last game against the Warriors, Kuminga had only two points on one for nine shooting, four rebounds, two assists, and a steal in 22 minutes of action. The Hawks did win that game but lost the minutes JK was on the court. Now more ingrained in a team that believes in him, he should look to get to the hoop when the lane is there, shoot the open three, and find the next open man if neither option is available.
No Guard to Change
The Golden State Warriors are not what they once were. They are not even the team that tussled with Minnesota in the second round of the playoffs in 2025.
The second timeline that promised a seamless change of the guard now plays for different teams. Only Moses Moody is still there from that initial youth movement that started with trading D’Angelo Russell to the Wolves (and he won’t even be playing in this game).
Stephen Curry still raises hell from the three-point line. Draymond Green can still play tricks on any offense looking for a sweet bucket. These moments are fewer, and much of the cast that props up these dynastic remnants is out with no clear timetable for return. Jimmy Butler, Porziņģis, and Moses Moody will look to suit up sometime in the winter if at all.
The freshest face the Warriors roll out is rookie Yaxel Lendeborg. At 24 years old, he’s the same age as much of the Wolves roster. He has shown flashes already and is able to make the reads that lead to open shots for his teammates.
If he gets the Anthony Edwards assignment, look for Yaxel to start chirping early, as he did against Luka Dončić. We have seen what happens when Ant feels a one-on-one competition brewing, and it rarely goes well for the opponent.
Prediction
The Wolves are still kicking themselves for letting the game in Cleveland slip away. Back in Target Center, they will jump out to an early lead on the back of Edwards giving Yaxel all he can stomach. Jonathan Kuminga will drill a three in front of the Warriors’ bench and earn a technical as he stands staring at them for a full thirty seconds.
By the start of the fourth quarter, Kerr will wave the white flag, and his bench of broken-down Hall of Famers will resemble the waiting room in Beetlejuice.
Our blogging buddies are over at Golden State of Mind. Be kind to our friends with sunny minds!
