Minnesota Timberwolves vs. New Orleans Pelicans
Date: February 6th, 2026
Time: 7:00 PM CST
Location: Target Center
Television Coverage: FanDuel Sports Network – North
Radio Coverage: KFAN FM, Wolves App, iHeart Radio<\/p>\n
With the trade deadline officially in the rearview mirror, we can finally stop living in the \u201crefresh the webpage\u201c portion of the season and look at what the Timberwolves actually are for the stretch run.<\/p>\n
And the answer is: they\u2019re the same Wolves we\u2019ve been watching all year, only now with one important twist. The Giannis-to-Minnesota smoke? No fire. No blockbuster. No franchise-altering earthquake. Instead, Tim Connelly went with the kind of move you make when you believe your roster is good enough to win in May and you\u2019re just trying to sand down the one spot that keeps making the chair wobble.<\/p>\n
So: out goes Mike Conley Jr., shipped to Chicago for cash considerations in an ending that\u2019s a little sad, a little cold, and also kind of inevitable for a veteran whose role had already shifted this season. Then the bigger practical move: the Wolves send Rob Dillingham, Leonard Miller, and some second-round picks to the Bulls for Ayo Dosunmu and Julian Phillips. Not sexy. Not headline-grabbing. But it\u2019s a real, adult trade deadline decision: add a functional ball-handler who can actually survive minutes in a playoff game.<\/p>\n
And then, almost like the basketball gods were testing whether Minnesota could handle a week without spiraling, this team finally did the thing that\u2019s been haunting them for more than two decades: they won in Toronto.<\/p>\n
Twenty-two years. A curse that was old enough to buy a drink and play craps in Vegas.<\/p>\n
And of course it didn\u2019t come easy. It wasn\u2019t a clean wire-to-wire \u201ctake care of business\u201d win. It was Minnesota doing the Minnesota thing: sloppy stretches, casual defense, the deficit ballooning to 18 in the third quarter, the team treating the first 36 minutes like a scrimmage and then trying to win the game in the last 12.<\/p>\n
But then the fourth quarter arrived, the screws finally tightened, and the Wolves actually guarded. Anthony Edwards threw on the hero cape, made the big plays, and Minnesota stole the game on the Raptors\u2019 home floor. And afterwards Ant dropped the kind of quote that\u2019s going to live in Wolves lore forever: Minnesota hadn\u2019t won north of the border since Bruce Lee died. Which is both completely unhinged and also\u2026 kind of perfect? That\u2019s the exact tone of a franchise trying to exorcise demons.<\/p>\n
Which brings us to the next opponent: the Pelicans.<\/p>\n
And this is where Wolves fans start making that face. The one where you\u2019re happy, but you\u2019re also bracing for impact. Because the Wolves\u2019 toughest opponent this season hasn\u2019t been OKC or San Antonio or Houston. It\u2019s been the mirror. It\u2019s been the version of themselves that decides effort is optional, that defense is something you can turn on late, that \u201cwe\u2019ll figure it out in the fourth\u201d is a personality trait instead of a red flag.<\/p>\n
New Orleans is the exact kind of team you can play down to. The exact kind of team you can let hang around. The exact kind of game that becomes dangerous if you treat it like a glorified scrimmage, especially because we\u2019ve already seen this matchup nearly go sideways. The first time these teams met in New Orleans, the Wolves needed overtime to escape. That\u2019s not \u201ceasy win.\u201d That\u2019s \u201cyou got taken to the brink by a team you\u2019re supposed to handle.\u201d<\/p>\n
And so, this game has become a professionalism test. Do the Wolves actually want to climb the standings, or do they want to keep wasting weeks?<\/p>\n
And with that question in mind, here are the keys.<\/p>\n
#1: Take it seriously from the opening tip, not from the eight-minute mark of the fourth.
The Pelicans are bad enough that Minnesota can beat them while playing a B-minus game\u2026 but only if they don\u2019t spend three quarters spotting them confidence. This is where the Wolves have repeatedly gotten themselves in trouble: they play with half-energy, they let the other team feel comfortable, and suddenly you\u2019re in a possession game late where randomness can steal it from you. Minnesota needs to come out like a team that just learned a hard lesson in Memphis and Toronto. They need to win the 50\u201350 balls, get to rebounds like they matter, and play like they understand that there\u2019s no such thing as a \u201cquality loss\u201d out West. If the Wolves set the tone early, New Orleans doesn\u2019t have the horsepower to keep up.<\/p>\n
#2: The perimeter defense has to show up.
It\u2019s incredible how different this team looks when the guards and wings actually treat point-of-attack defense like a job requirement. When Donte, Jaden, and Jaylen Clark are hunting, getting into bodies, cutting off lanes, and closing out with urgency, the Wolves become a miserable team to play. When they\u2019re lazy, it turns into the same movie every time: blow-bys, scrambling rotations, Rudy cleaning up messes until he can\u2019t, and a parade to the rim that makes the opponent look better than they are. The Wolves flipped the switch in Toronto\u2019s fourth quarter. Great. Now do it for 48 minutes at home. The Pelicans can\u2019t keep pace unless Minnesota gifts them easy stuff.<\/p>\n
#3: Punish them with size.
Gone are the Jonas Valan\u010di\u016bnas days for New Orleans, but don\u2019t mistake that for \u201cno interior threat.\u201d Rookie Derik Queen gave Minnesota problems in the earlier matchups because he played hard, he competed on the glass, and he didn\u2019t act like he was supposed to be impressed by the Wolves\u2019 bigs. Rudy, Julius, and Naz can\u2019t let a rookie outwork them again, not on their floor. This is where Minnesota should be able to build separation: win the rebound battle, create second-chance points, and turn New Orleans\u2019 misses into demoralizing possessions where the Wolves get a putback, then a lob, then another offensive board. The Wolves have the bodies to make this a paint-nightmare for the Pelicans. They have to actually use them.<\/p>\n
#4: Keep the ball moving.
This is the trap game trap: you see a lesser opponent, and suddenly everybody wants to \u201cget theirs.\u201d Ant starts hunting highlights. Julius starts trying to bully through three guys. Possessions get sticky. The ball stops. And before you know it, you\u2019ve turned a comfortable game into a grind because you\u2019re playing exactly the kind of isolation basketball that lets an inferior team hang around. The Wolves need to push pace, and keep the offense from devolving into \u201cmy turn, your turn.\u201d Make the Pelicans guard multiple actions. Let the open threes come from movement, not from heat-check ego.<\/p>\n
#5: Be professionals, because the schedule is finally giving you oxygen, and you can\u2019t waste it.
This is the broader point. February has been set up pretty nicely for Minnesota. The deadline drama is over. The roster is what it is. The standings are tight enough that a two-week heater changes your life. But the Wolves have to stop acting like the season is something they can turn on whenever they feel like it. This game at Target Center against one of the weaker teams in the conference is exactly the kind of win a serious team banks without drama. And it starts with Ant and Randle setting the tone. If they come out locked in, everyone follows. If they come out casual, everyone follows that too. That\u2019s what leadership is, for better or worse.<\/p>\n
And here\u2019s the thing: nobody\u2019s coming to save them now. No Giannis cavalry. No deadline miracle. No external fix. The trade smoke is gone, the reality is here, and the reality is this roster has enough talent to make a real run.<\/p>\n
But talent doesn\u2019t win games by itself, not for this team. Not in this conference. Not with this many standings landmines.<\/p>\n
So beat the Pelicans. Take the points. Stack the win. Keep climbing. Because if Minnesota is serious about turning Toronto into a turning point instead of a fun trivia answer, it starts with the simplest, least glamorous thing in the NBA:<\/p>\n
Show up at home. Play hard. Do your job.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Minnesota Timberwolves vs. New Orleans PelicansDate: February 6th, 2026Time: 7:00 PM CSTLocation: Target CenterTelevision Coverage: FanDuel Sports Network…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":585307,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3796],"tags":[7,6,478,470,4073,4072,675,64153],"class_list":{"0":"post-585306","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-new-orleans-pelicans","8":"tag-basketball","9":"tag-nba","10":"tag-new-orleans","11":"tag-new-orleans-pelicans","12":"tag-neworleans","13":"tag-neworleanspelicans","14":"tag-pelicans","15":"tag-timberwolves-game-discussion"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/116021271768966096","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/585306","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=585306"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/585306\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/585307"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=585306"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=585306"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=585306"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}