The Minnesota Timberwolves own an 8-5 record over three weeks into the 2025-26 season. All eight of their wins have been against teams with records below .500. All five of their losses have been against teams with a record over .500.
Knowing how to break that down is difficult. The Wolves have looked great in the wins. They blew out the Utah Jazz by 40 points last week, beat the Sacramento Kings by 27 points, took care of the Jazz on Monday, and beat the Kings again on Friday.
But in the losses, the Wolves have not looked like a team with championship aspirations. Most recently, on Saturday, the Denver Nuggets beat them 123-112 at Target Center. That was Minnesota’s second loss to Denver at home this season already.
So are the Wolves, sitting three games over .500, actually a good team right now? Or are they a mediocre team whose lighter schedule has covered up their issues? It’s difficult to tell because this team isn’t playing like itself.
However, that isn’t necessarily a bad thing. In all eight of the Wolves’ wins, they have shown an intangible that they have never consistently had under Chris Finch.
They are finally winning the games they are supposed to, a mark that this team has taken a maturity step that should bode well for the rest of the season. However, the Wolves still have a way to go before they become the team they have set out to be.
“We’ve approached these games in a real professional manner,” Mike Conley told Dan Barreiro on KFAN last week. “The starting guys go out there, and they kind of set the tone. They get us off to really, really good starts, which is exactly what we need in games like that, where you don’t want to be sleepwalking into the game.”
Last season, the Wolves lost 24 games that Vegas favored them to win — the most in the NBA. But even when the Wolves covered the spread against bad teams, they didn’t play with the level of professionalism that they needed to dispatch opponents before the fourth quarter.
Playing down to their opponent has been a common theme for the Wolves over the last few seasons. It’s frustrating because, even though the playoffs feature no bad teams, had Minnesota taken better care of business in the regular season, they could have had a better spot in the standings once the postseason began.
Every game is important. There are no nights off because one or two wins can separate the sixth-place team in the Western Conference from the third. The Wolves seem to have grasped that this season behind inspired, professional play from their starting lineup.
Anthony Edwards is averaging 27.3 points in nine of 12 games. He has had stretches of unstoppable, MVP-level scoring in six of those games. Julius Randle is making a great case to make his fourth All-Star game. He’s averaging 25.5 points, 7.4 rebounds, and 6.2 assists on 54% from deep and 39% from deep. Jaden McDaniels has leaped into the offensive player that the Wolves have always hoped he’d become, averaging 17.7 points on 55% from the floor and 50% from deep.
The Wolves haven’t throttled all of the bad teams this season, but they’ve beaten every one, even if it does come down to a third or fourth quarter of dominance.
“It’s more of a business-like approach,” Naz Reid said during practice on Friday. “You come into work, no matter who is in front of you, you’ve got to go out, compete, and win the game. That’s the end goal — win the game. It’s been more of a business-like approach, understanding we need those wins.”
In September, Reid’s older sister, Toraya, was fatally shot in New Jersey. She was 28 years old. Her tragic death devastated Reid and his family. The Wolves have assured Naz that they have his complete support and have made an effort to keep things as normal as possible this season. However, things aren’t normal.
Not only is he grieving, but Nas is also trying to find a groove on the court.
Reid is averaging 11.5 points so far this season on 44% from the floor and 35% from deep. He hasn’t had his usual offensive spark, the spark that won him 6MOTY two years ago, and the spark that has made him beloved in Minnesota. Given the mental battles Reid is facing, his slow start is understandable.
But as the season progresses, Reid continues to look more like himself.
“What we need right now is a little bit more juice from our bench,” Finch said after Friday’s win. “I think our bench is too focused on production and not focused on energy enough.”
RIGHT BEFORE THE BUZZER
— Minnesota Timberwolves (@Timberwolves) November 16, 2025
Saturday against Denver, Reid scored 19 points on 7 of 11 from the floor and 4 of 7 from deep. Offensively, he was exactly the player who won 6MOTY two years ago. The same guy who helped form Minnesota’s D.N.A. strand (Donte DiVincenzo, Naz, and Nickeil Alexander-Walker) off the bench. Not only that, but Reid provided the Wolves with juice every minute he was on the floor.
It will be imperative that he continues that, even more so than his scoring.
The Wolves were banking on their “continuity” to help give them a jolt early in the season after having a quiet off-season. Alexander-Walker signed with the Atlanta Hawks. But other than his departure, Minnesota’s rotation remained intact.
Still, the bench has undergone more turnover than it may seem.
With DiVincenzo starting in place of Conley, Finch has almost completely reworked the framework of Minnesota’s bench. Not only are the Wolves missing NAW’s three-point shooting and defense, but they are also missing DDV’s spark off the bench. Conley is shooting 47% from deep this season. He’s playing much better after a slow start to the season. Still, Minnesota’s bench has not been the sparkplug it was last season.
Even with that change, Minnesota has consistently shown there is a large gap between itself and its lesser opponents whenever it has played them. The Timberwolves have done it with a bench that has yet to reach its full potential. However, because the Wolves have yet to play the same way against the good teams, a gap also exists between themselves and the teams they will have to go through to win a championship.
Their 0-5 record against teams above .500 is glaring, but some context is needed.
- Both losses to Denver have been on the tail end of a back-to-back.
- Two of the four games Edwards missed were against the Nuggets and the Los Angeles Lakers.
- He returned against the Knicks and was rusty. He shot 5 of 13 from the floor, scored 15 points, and was a -25 in 29 minutes.
- Jaylen Clark has been invaluable to the defense, and he also missed the same Nuggets and Lakers games that Ant did.
Still, for all the asterisks that you can pencil in next to the losses, the Wolves have struggled defensively for most of the season, regardless of any outside factors.
On Saturday, the Wolves may have been lightly fatigued from playing the night before, but they were fully healthy and still struggled to defend for a full 48 minutes. Denver created a slew of quality shots with one pass, which can’t happen when Nikola Jokić is on the floor. Not only that, but Jamal Murray got past Minnesota’s point-of-attack defense far too easily.
Unlike in the past, the Wolves are a better offensive team than a defensive team. They rank fourth in offensive rating and 17th in defensive rating. Behind All-Star-level play from Edwards and Randle, and super consistent shot-making from McDaniels, Minnesota’s offense has been borderline elite for a good chunk of this season.
However, when it inevitably isn’t — when the Wolves shoot 47%, commit 13 turnovers, and Ant shoots 8 of 23 on the tail end of a back-to-back, like they did against Denver — they need their defense to be the backbone that holds them up. Minnesota wants to be a defensive-oriented team, which it has been for the last two seasons. They probably need to be to beat the good teams consistently.
The Wolves have the tools to be a stout defensive team, even without Alexander-Walker. It’s going to take a greater buy-in from the entire team for a full 48 minutes. And once it does, Minnesota should have no problem being top ten in offensive and defensive rating.
“If you can get a top ten offense and defense, you’re kind of in the money,” Conley told Barrerio. “You can do something with that.”
Minnesota isn’t there now. They are working through the issues that many thought they wouldn’t have to because of their quiet off-season. It hasn’t been the fast start Finch and the Wolves were hoping for, but they still sit three games over .500 because they are winning games against losing teams.
There is a good team capable of another deep postseason run nestled within Minnesota’s 8-5 start, and you don’t have to dig far to find it. The Wolves will continue to have a lighter schedule over the rest of November. The hope is that, during that span, they will put enough pieces together to remain the same dominant team regardless of who they are playing.