HOUSTON — It took a minute for the gleam to return to Anthony Edwards’ eye. He walked onto the basketball court for his second game in the last month, a finicky knee injury messing with his sterling record of durability and the psyche of his Minnesota Timberwolves.
He spent his first two shifts dancing around the ring, slipping jabs and playing defense while he got his legs underneath him. That is not the “5” the Timberwolves need as the playoffs approach. That is not the Ant-Man who can knock an opponent into next week.
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Edwards is not a boxer. He’s a brawler. In the third quarter against the Houston Rockets on Friday night, he started swinging. When the short-handed Timberwolves were down 10 points midway through the period, Edwards made his move. It started with a 3-pointer over Jae’Sean Tate that got the attention of a Toyota Center crowd that seemed unconcerned with a Wolves team resting four of its top eight players. A pull-up jumper at the foul line over Jabari Smith followed.
“Got it,” play-by-play announcer Michael Grady said on Amazon Prime. “Now he’s starting to talk.”
Then came another step-back 3 over Tate, cutting Houston’s lead to two points and serving as Edwards’ official welcome back moment. As he backpedaled his way down the court, his mouth was running a mile a minute and the entire arena was recoiling with the kind of nervousness that few scorers in this league can instill.
That flurry of punches staggered the Rockets, who had won eight straight games and were playing all of their players in a last-ditch effort to secure the No. 3 seed. He knocked them out with another step-back 3 over old friend Josh Okogie in the fourth quarter, capping a night of controlled fury in which he picked the exact right times to defer to teammates and the exact right times to be aggressive, looking for his own shot.
“That’s why he’s one of the best players in the NBA,” said Donte DiVincenzo, who scored 11 of his 18 points in the fourth quarter. “We need him to do that, and we need him to be on the defensive side and we need to rebound. He knows what he’s capable of. We all know what he’s capable of. Good to see him back on the court.”
This is the “5” the Wolves have been missing. This is the player who doesn’t just win games, but wins series. He had missed 10 of the previous 11 games with inflammation in his right knee. During that time, the Wolves fielded the 29th-ranked offense in the NBA. Jaden McDaniels was missing for much of that stretch as well, and with both of them back in the lineup on Friday night for the first time since March 15, the Wolves had one of their best offensive games of the season in a 136-132 win over the Rockets.
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Edwards scored 22 points in 27 minutes, leading seven players with at least 14 points. Terrence Shannon Jr. had another explosive game off the bench, putting up 23 points and going 5 for 7 from 3. Minnesota shot 57 percent from the field, 50 percent (15 for 30) from 3 and only turned it over eight times against Houston’s aggressive defense.
The Timberwolves (48-33) have known they were locked into the No. 6 seed in the Western Conference playoffs for most of the week. That gave them the luxury of planning out these last few games to focus on what they need and nothing else. It allowed them to give Julius Randle, Rudy Gobert, Naz Reid and Bones Hyland some needed rest, while also playing Edwards 27 minutes and McDaniels, who returned on Wednesday from a six-game absence because of a knee injury, 35 minutes to work on their conditioning.
Minnesota will not know its playoff opponent until Sunday. If the Denver Nuggets beat the San Antonio Spurs or the Los Angeles Lakers lose to Utah on Sunday, the Wolves will face the Nuggets in the first round. If the Nuggets lose to the Spurs and the Lakers win, Game 1 will be in Los Angeles against the Luka-less, Reaves-less Lakers.
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Who they play is certainly important, but how they are playing is the much bigger issue right now. The Wolves have had one of the league’s more disappointing regular seasons to this point. Coming off two straight runs to the conference finals and bringing nearly everyone back led to expectations that this team would challenge for its first NBA Finals appearance. The talent is there to justify the expectations.
Instead, this has been a season of complacency. The Wolves have never won more than five games in a row and, frankly, never seemed all that interested in giving their best effort. Just when they started to try to find the gas pedal, Edwards, McDaniels and Reid (shoulder) all suffered injuries that have slowed them down. The way the season is coming to a close gives them the best chance they could ask for to find the potential they believe is inside them.
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Randle played in the first 78 games of the season, but has been battling ailments in his right hand and foot for a while. He likely will sit out the final three games of the regular season, including the finale against the New Orleans Pelicans on Sunday, which should give him a nice runway to be fully ready for the playoffs. Gobert is getting some rest as well, never a bad thing for a 33-year-old center who will need everything he has and more if the Wolves face Nikola Jokić and Denver in the first round.
Reid got a well-deserved night off, too, an opportunity to rest his ailing shoulder. Coach Chris Finch felt more comfortable giving him a breather because of how well the struggling forward played in his previous two games. Bones Hyland sat with a sore hip.
McDaniels had 16 points, seven rebounds and four blocked shots in his second game back from the knee injury, including a devastating series of defensive stops on the Rockets at the rim in the fourth quarter that could serve as his closing arguments for an All-Defense honor.
Edwards, who declined comment after the game, made 7 of 14 shots and hit his last three 3s after starting the game 0 for 4 from deep.
“I love it,” Shannon said. “I told him when he missed his first couple you’re going to make the next three. That’s that he did and he took us home.”
Shannon is making quite an impression as the season winds to a close. He scored 33 points in the loss to Orlando on Wednesday and has hit 10 3s in his last two games. A season of frustration, thanks to a bothersome foot injury, is turning around at just the right time. His ability to get downhill and attack the rim while also hitting his shots from the perimeter is giving Finch something to think about as he charts his playoff rotation this week.
“Obviously, he’s shooting the heck out of the ball, and shooting with a ton of confidence and gives us a great option,” Finch said. “We have a lot of options right now, which is what you want when you go into the playoffs.”
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Mike Conley hit all three of his 3s and is 12 for 19 from deep over his last four games. Kyle Anderson had 17 points, nine assists and six rebounds, Joan Beringer scored 14 points and Ayo Dosunmu added 15 points and four assists.
The balance offensively was enough to overcome a ridiculous scoring night from the Rockets. Amen Thompson scored 41 points. Kevin Durant had 33, seven rebounds and seven assists. Houston shot 61 percent from the field while racking up a staggering 86 points in the paint, but were only 4 for 18 from 3 and managed just 26 points in the fourth, losing a game they wanted to win.
“I think once we got locked into a situation, once we clinched and knew that we were one of those top six teams, guys like Julius, Rudy, guys can relax, get a little rest,” Conley said. “It gives us all opportunities to compete. A lot of our guys who don’t get a lot of minutes, but it is a weight off the shoulders. You can just kind of go out there and hoop.”
It has been a season of stops and starts, of missed opportunities and unearned arrogance. Yet, everything the Wolves want is still there for them to grab. McDaniels is back. Randle, Gobert and Reid will be rested. DiVincenzo and Conley are starting to hit shots. Shannon looks ready to have some type of role going forward, and a coaching staff with a history of preparing the team for its first-round opponent has a full week to install a game plan for whoever the Wolves will face.
That is all well and good, but everyone in the visitors’ locker room who was smiling ear to ear as Edwards strutted and smack-talked. Everyone in the stands who sighed helplessly when he splashed the Rockets to death knows that the Timberwolves’ chances to make some noise in the playoffs begin and end with Anthony Edwards.
The knee looked fine. The shot looked pure. And the Timberwolves, at least for one night, looked dangerous again.