Anthony Edwards leaned over to Warriors guard Gary Payton II during Game 3 on Saturday in San Francisco and said, “Y’all tryna get to Game 6 and get Wardell back.”
Wardell is the official first name of Steph Curry, who has been absent from the series since he left the second quarter of Game 1 with a hamstring injury.
“That is the plan,” Payton said.
Of course it is. Golden State cannot hang with Minnesota with its superstar on the bench. But when Curry is on the floor, all bets are off. It’s no guarantee he’d be back on Sunday, but Curry’s most likely return date was always Game 6.
Minnesota is one win away from ending the Western Conference semifinal before that return could come to fruition. That’s a big reason for Minnesota to take care of business in Game 5 on Wednesday at Target Center, which could serve as Minnesota’s first series closeout victory in Minneapolis since 2004.
It would be easy for Minnesota to overlook Wednesday’s bout. Two of its last three wins over the Warriors have come with relative ease. The Timberwolves are 10½-point favorites in Game 5. The general assumption is the Wolves buried the Warriors in Game 4 on Monday in San Francisco.
And perhaps that’s true. Maybe Golden State will walk onto the Target Center floor Wednesday merely out of obligation and go through the motions for 48 minutes before confirming offseason travel plans.
More likely, though, is the Warriors will battle, just as they’ve done all series and even when undermanned. Sans Curry, Golden State’s brand of basketball has not been pretty, but you cannot accuse the Warriors of not playing hard. Minnesota has gotten itself into sticky situations throughout the series when it has not matched Golden State’s intensity.
The Wolves lamented the closing five minutes of Monday’s Game 4 victory, in which they were out scored by 14 points by Golden State’s end-of-the-bench unit. There can be no letup.
“We’ve just got to drown out everything and then lock into this simulation. Like we’re in this focus of Golden State-Minnesota. Nothing else matters,” Wolves guard Nickeil Alexander-Walker said. “Being present, being in the moment. Making sure that we’re not playing for Game 5 with three minutes left in Game 4. And tip your hat to the guys that came in and played hard and really made us play hard. We took our foot off a little bit.
“But stuff like that, small things like that, carry over. Because who knows if they had 30 more seconds? Who knows?”
It was a similar story in the first half Monday, during which Golden State outexecuted and outworked Minnesota for the game’s first 24 minutes, and led by two at the break because of it.
“Just gameplan mistakes that can’t happen if you want to beat a championship team and if you want to move into the Finals — or Western Conference Finals, at least. You can’t,” Anthony Edwards said. “You can’t let those things happen. You’ve got to be better.”
Golden State’s narrow path to success since losing Curry has been clear. The Warriors have to play in transition, get numerous defensive stops and win the possession battle via turnovers and rebounds. The good thing about that, Alexander-Walker noted, is those are all controllables.
“It’s just kind of accepting the challenge. You know they’re going to play hard. You know they’re going to be scrappy and physical,” Wolves guard Mike Conley said. “And so we can’t come into any game relaxed or calm or getting comfortable. It’s just about how our edge has to continue to show up early in the game and last throughout the four quarters, because they’re going to just keep throwing everything at you and keep competing.”
Minnesota has lauded Golden State’s “championship DNA” throughout the series. The Wolves don’t expect that to wane with the Warriors in a do-or-die scenario Wednesday. While doubt has likely entered the Warriors’ minds, it would only take a bit of reason to believe Wednesday for Golden State to begin to envision a series-extending victory that could welcome Curry back into the fold.
“It’s still just a one-game series for us. The most important one is always the next one,” Conley said. “We know this team we’re up against, and the coaching that they have and how prepared they’re going to be. They’re going to be giving us every look they can. They’re going to come out playing hard, and we have to look to match it and exceed it to win this one, because it’s going to be the toughest one.”
And a win Wednesday would earn Minnesota additional rest ahead of the start of the Western Conference Finals. Every time the Wolves have had time off to prepare and recoup over the past two seasons, it has served them well.
Alexander-Walker said Minnesota needs to understand “the moment” on Wednesday.
“Can’t live in the past. Can’t jump too far ahead. Have to be present and understand that these are situations that are pivotal,” Alexander-Walker said. “You have a chance to close out on your home court as opposed to having to go elsewhere and try to win and then do it again and come back on the road and travel. As much of an advantage as you can gain in these playoffs, you want to keep that and play with that and use that. … For us, it’s just about defending home court, being better than that and growing. It’s far from over.”
Well, not far — not if Minnesota brings the proper approach on Wednesday evening.
“We’ve got to take care of business, we’ve got to be locked in,” Conley said. “And then we’ll worry about the rest later.”
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