Minnesota beat a severely short-handed Warriors team Monday to snap the Timberwolves\u2019 five-game losing streak. But Wolves coach Chris Finch was quick to point out many of the guys they played against Monday were the ones pouring it on them in a 111-85 loss a day earlier.<\/p>\n
They had no such opportunity to do so in the Wolves\u2019 108-83 victory. Minnesota cut off all air space on Monday as Golden State shot just 35% from the field and 23% from 3-point range while turning the ball over 19 times. Center Rudy Gobert was dominant, as was the team-wide gameplan discipline.<\/p>\n
\u201cGuys just flying around, covering for each other,\u201d Finch said. \u201cWith that group, you\u2019ve just gotta keep closing out, keep containing the ball. And I thought that was better for us.\u201d<\/p>\n
It was where it needed to be if Minnesota wants to win games at a high clip over the last half of the season. Monday marked the 14th time this season the Wolves have held an opponent to fewer than 106 points per 100 possessions in a game, and Minnesota is 14-0 in those bouts.<\/p>\n
Defense is the ultimate barometer for Timberwolves\u2019 team success. When they defended at a high level on a nightly basis two seasons ago, the end result was 56 victories.\u00a0That effort has waxed and waned each of the past two seasons, and the team\u2019s success has been equally inconsistent.<\/p>\n
Monday was another reminder of what\u2019s possible on that end of the floor. Minnesota still has the personnel to be an elite defensive team, anchored by the likes of Jaden McDaniels and Gobert.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s a start, with the urgency we had to have,\u201d Wolves forward Naz Reid said. \u201cWe had to make the step in the right direction and do what we\u2019re supposed to do.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cOur activity, our trust set the tone for the guys,\u201d Gobert added. \u201cI thought we did a great job just being physical, running back, communicating and contesting everything.\u201d<\/p>\n
Asked what keyed Monday\u2019s defensive turnaround, Finch responded: \u201cDesperation, of course.\u201d<\/p>\n
It\u2019s easier to muster effort and energy when you desperately need a victory. The Wolves had a lengthy team chat after Sunday\u2019s blowout loss to Golden State. It was nearly an expectation they\u2019d respond a day later.<\/p>\n
A speech or circumstance may be a motivator for a game or two, but it\u2019s not a long-term solution.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis needs to be something that is a night-in and night-out thing where you play with energy,\u201d Wolves guard Donte DiVincenzo said. \u201cYou\u2019re going to miss shots. You\u2019re going to turn the ball over. You\u2019re going to have lapses. But a team to just come in and play harder than us, that\u2019s not acceptable. And that is the collective thought\u00a0 process of what we got out of this.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe have the talent. We have the Xs and Os, we have the coaching. We have everything we need. But we need to play hard and, top to bottom, you need to come out there and play with energy at all times.\u201d<\/p>\n
Truthfully, that\u2019s not easy. Eighty-two game seasons are long. Reid described the current stretch of the campaign as \u201cthe dog days\u201d for everyone across the league. But he noted Minnesota has to push through it and find itself again as a team.<\/p>\n
The good news for the Wolves (28-19) is they know what that optimal identity is: a ferocious defensive collective that makes opponents work for everything. It\u2019s not what\u2019s sexy. Gobert noted you\u2019re far more likely to get recognized for the number of points you score. It\u2019s why he thinks defense does so frequently slip across the league.<\/p>\n
But it\u2019s what wins.<\/p>\n
Minnesota is 26-8 this season when holding opponents south of 118 points per 100 possessions, and 2-11 when it doesn\u2019t. In wins this year, the Wolves\u2019 defensive rating is 106.3. In losses, that number plummets to 120.5.<\/p>\n
\u201cHopefully we realize that this is what we need to hang our hat on. That\u2019s what we need to bring every single night. If we bring that every single night, good things happen,\u201d Gobert said. \u201cWe might not play great all the time, we might not make shots all the time. But if we bring that level of urgency, that level of intensity defensively, starting from, obviously, the leaders down to everybody else, we\u2019re a great team.\u201d<\/p>\n
It looked like Minnesota remembered as much Monday. But is that mentality now here to stay?<\/p>\n
\u201cThis team forgets a lot of things,\u201d Finch said. \u201cWe\u2019ll go through moods, and everything starts at the defensive end.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Minnesota beat a severely short-handed Warriors team Monday to snap the Timberwolves\u2019 five-game losing streak. But Wolves coach…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":564753,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[3782],"tags":[7,2026,307,152,3954,6,373,66,308],"class_list":{"0":"post-564752","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-minnesota-timberwolves","8":"tag-basketball","9":"tag-chris-finch","10":"tag-minnesota","11":"tag-minnesota-timberwolves","12":"tag-minnesotatimberwolves","13":"tag-nba","14":"tag-rudy-gobert","15":"tag-sports","16":"tag-timberwolves"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/115969020806899089","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/564752","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=564752"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/564752\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/564753"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=564752"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=564752"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=564752"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}