Timberwolves coach Chris Finch responded with a joke when asked about Minnesota’s excellent ball movement in its exhibition opener against Denver earlier this month.
“This is passing and cutting season,” Finch quipped.
The evidence of that mounts with each season. A year ago, Minnesota’s offense was majestic in the preseason slate, with a high volume of ball and body movement and players passing up good shots to generate great ones for others.
It’s the purest form of offensive basketball — one that’s easier to play when stats don’t count.
Finch warned a year ago that it all could come to a crashing halt when the ball tipped for real. He was proven prophetic as Minnesota inched out of the gates with a bogged down offense in its season opener in Los Angeles.
The story heading into the 2022 exhibition slate was the high level of buy-in from D’Angelo Russell coming off a productive offseason. He was dealt ahead of the trade deadline.
Josh Minott was last year’s camp darling. He finished the year with 276 minutes played, 12th-most on the team. Donte DiVincenzo played brilliant basketball in the exhibition slate in 2024, then struggled mightily over the first third of the season.
All that is to say, little in the preseason can be believed or taken seriously.
That’s not to suggest fans shouldn’t consume or enjoy their first taste of the season.
Just don’t use any breadcrumbs from preseason basketball as hard evidence to draw meaningful conclusions. It’s rarely predictive of what’s to come.
The Dallas Mavericks were blitzed twice by the Wolves in Abu Dhabi, then lost to Real Madrid to open the 2023 preseason. Dallas went on to win the Western Conference.
The Nuggets looked entirely lost during their 2024 exhibition slate, then came as close as anyone to knocking off Oklahoma City in the 2025 playoffs.
Rob Dillingham lit up a Chinese Basketball Association team Monday at Target Center, six days after looking unplayable in a loss to Indiana.
There isn’t much reason to put stock into either performance. The Timberwolves have seen Dillingham play in NBA regular-season games. They watch him compete in camp every day. That’s all far more valuable data than what can be gained in preseason or Summer League competition.
Meanwhile, Mike Conley has played 14 minutes total this preseason, as Minnesota preserves its veteran floor general for when the games start to count.
The Wolves use training camp to attempt to establish habits they can carry throughout the ensuing eight months of basketball. But exactly which ones take hold won’t be clear until Minnesota plays Portland in the regular season opener a week from today, and beyond.
That’s when the real data will be collected. When the real storylines will unfold. When the impact players will determine the trajectory and outcome of the Timberwolves’ season.
Everything until then is entirely subject to change.
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