Anthony Edwards had no reason to walk off the court — as he did with nearly eight minutes left during a loss against the Atlanta Hawks — as the Minnesota Timberwolves defeated the Miami Heat, 125-115, ending Miami’s four-game winning streak. They are now in sixth place in the Western Conference with a 22-13 record.
After an up-and-down stretch to end 2025, the Timberwolves will surely be cherishing this win. Not only did it get them out of their funk — which they direly needed — but it also demonstrated what “Timberwolves basketball” is all about.
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Against the Heat, the sixth-best team in the East, Edwards saw a different hunger to win from his team. Combine that with consistent play, and the superstar guard does not doubt that they can take on anybody in the league.
“I feel like we can beat everybody,” he said after the game. “But if we play to a certain level, yeah, I feel like we can beat everyone. But sometimes we play to that level, sometimes we don’t.”
Wolves listened to the game plan
The Wolves led for most of the game, but their grip loosened late in the second and allowed a quick Miami run in the third quarter, which saw the Heat lead by as much as three points. Minnesota responded, outscoring Miami 35-29 in the payoff period to pull away and grab the hard-fought victory.
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Edwards led his team with 33 points and five assists, while Naz Reid scored 29 points on 66.7 percent shooting. Julius Randle contributed a 23-point, 10-rebound double-double, and Rudy Gobert tallied a double-double of his own with 13 points and 12 rebounds.
The Timberwolves still have a lot to improve on, especially in the playmaking department. Their bench also needs to step up, as outside of Reid, nobody scored above five points.
However, tonight the team showed a tremendous amount of effort and stuck to the game plan. For Edwards, that is all they need to win, and they will continue to do so.
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“Most of the time we just don’t listen to the game plan, but when we listen to it and execute it, we’d be pretty good,” he said. “We hard-headed. We want to make the game harder, but we listened tonight, and it worked.”
T-Wolves bounced back
Edwards has been carrying his team, averaging 29.1 points on 49.9 percent shooting on the season. But against the Heat, everybody clicked.
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This cohesion echoed what head coach Chris Finch had preached before their game against Miami.
“Everybody goes through these patches during the season. Before that, we won 10 of 13. The great thing about our league is you always have a chance to go out and play your best basketball,” he said, via Thr Athletic’s Jon Krawczynski.
Recently, Gobert took a shot at the Timberwolves, questioning their commitment to compete for the championship. It’s safe to say that they dropped that mentality this game.
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“I thought we really had consistent energy for most of the evening,” Finch said after the win. “When they came back and took the lead, we steadied ourselves and made a response and played some of our best basketball at that point.”
Energy, effort, consistency, and composure fueled Finch’s game plan, allowing Edwards and the Timberwolves to hold off the Heat. With those attributes, they can keep up with their Western Conference foes and, as Edwards boldly claimed, perhaps even “beat everyone.”
This story was originally published by Basketball Network on Jan 4, 2026, where it first appeared in the Latest News section. Add Basketball Network as a Preferred Source by clicking here.