With 10:06 left between the Minnesota Timberwolves and Los Angeles Lakers in the third quarter, Anthony Davis shot a pair of free throws with his team ahead by 16 points. Julius Randle was lined up across from Rudy Gobert, with Rui Hachimura to Gobert’s right and Austin Reaves to Randle’s left.
Reaves acted like he would run back on defense as Davis shot his second free throw. Instead, he faked out Randle and crashed in for one of L.A.’s 15 offensive rebounds.
Lakers fans cheered as Wolves fans collectively groaned, watching the game back in the Twin Cities. The rebound itself added insult to injury, but Randle’s lack of effort made it even worse.
The Timberwolves fell 124-107 in their season debut against the Lakers. They trailed by as many as 22 points, and the game felt over by halftime. Randle finished with 16 points and nine rebounds on 5 of 10 from the floor in 34 minutes, which looks good on paper. However, Randle – and Minnesota as a whole – didn’t rise to the occasion during critical stretches.
“We have to find another level of urgency right now,” Chris Finch told reporters postgame. “The season started, and we didn’t answer the bell.”
It was a nightmarish way for the season to start after Minnesota traded Karl-Anthony Towns less than a month prior. The NBA rewarded the Wolves by slating them as the nightcap on opening night after their run to the Western Conference Finals last year. However, they responded by melting under the bright lights of LA.
“We made some lazy plays and passes. We weren’t ready to play today,” said Anthony Edwards postgame. “We came out too relaxed. People respect us. We will be better in Sacramento.”
The Wolves needed a fast start 48 hours later as they marched into Golden 1 Center to take on the Kings in their home opener. Had they started slow, Minnesota would have been lost in the deafening decibel levels produced by excited Kings fans.
More importantly, the Wolves needed to convince their fans to believe in the team.
Before the game, the Wolves announced they had sold 11,000 season tickets for the 2024-25 season, the most since 1990 when they played at the Metrodome. By winning, the Timberwolves have activated a latent fanbase. After last season’s deep postseason run, they expect Minnesota to contend for a championship. However, the team took a step backward in most fans’ eyes when they traded Towns and two more steps back after the uninspiring loss to open the season.
Sacramento jumped out to an early 14-8 start Thursday night. The Wolves had more energy than they did off the jump against the Lakers, but the offense was still clunky. The Kings were dominating the pace game and switching well on defense.
With 6:46 left in the first quarter, Randle connected on his second three-pointer of the night, which sparked a 21-17 run from the Wolves to close the quarter. Julius was responsible for 11 of those points as the scorer or passer, capping it off with a side-step three at the buzzer.
The Wolves and Kings exchanged blows in the second quarter as the intensity slowly increased. After shooting 10 of 20 from the floor and 7 of 14 from deep in the first, Minnesota’s offense cooled off in the second, going 3 of 11 from three and 9 of 22 overall. The Wolves trailed by four points at halftime. Still, without Randle’s contributions, they would have been staring at a double-digit hole, Golden 1 Center rocking and going down 0-2 on the year rapidly approaching.
“He was phenomenal,” said Finch regarding Randle’s performance. “He set the tone and kept us in the game early almost all by himself. … [Randle] was decisive, shot the ball well, created a ton of shots for his teammates, and played with great physicality.”
Randle displayed a heightened version of what Wolves fans can expect to see from him as he gets on the same page with his new team. He led all scorers with 22 points at halftime on an unconscious 8 of 10 from the floor and 4 of 5 from deep.
It was exactly what Wolves fans needed to see from Randle. The wounds of losing Towns so late in the off-season were fresh entering the season, but optimism prevailed. However, The Lakers sucked most of that sanguineness out of the fanbase in the season opener. The Wolves crowd is used to seeing Randle dominate on the other side. They know he can put up big numbers, but some questioned if he could play well alongside Edwards.
Minnesota quelled those concerns by pulling off a 117-115 win after digging itself an 11-point deficit in the third quarter.
“Oh my God. We told him, ‘Don’t fit around us, we are going to fit around you,’” Edwards told Lea B. Olsen postgame. “With Julius being himself, we are going to be trouble.”
Randle and Edwards are ball-dominant players. One is an 11-year NBA veteran, the other a rising superstar. Two polarizing players on different timelines with different outlooks on the NBA could translate to fighting for who is the No. 1 option and who is the No. 2.
However, Randle knows this is Ant’s team.
“Ant’s got me over his shoulder. Whatever he needs, I am going to be right there. He has a dog next to him who will compete every night,” said Randle before Minnesota’s first preseason game. “He’s a generational talent. You get very few chances to play with a player like that. With my experience and the little bit of success I have had, I want to be able to pass it on to him and help him in any way I can.”
Randle shot the ball only seven times in the second half and three times in the fourth quarter. He demanded that the defense double-team him in the first half but took a backseat in the second because his new co-star was taking over the game.
“Give Ant the ball,” Randle told reporters when asked what made Minnesota’s late-game offense so effective. “Just get him the ball and let him make plays. If they double-team him, I am there for him. We have outlets around him. If they don’t [double him], good luck.”
Edwards went 3 of 9 from the floor in the first half. His shot was long, short, and wide – he even airballed a mid-range pull-up. Ant still couldn’t find a rhythm in the new season but didn’t force the issue, which he did against the Lakers. Finch said Edwards tried to do too much during the season opener because the team’s offense was flat. However, that wasn’t the case on Thursday, primarily because of Randle’s ability to keep the Wolves in the game.
While speaking with the media in the locker room, Edwards reiterated what he told Fanduel Sports North regarding Randle right after the final buzzer. “He averaged 28, 5, and was an All-Star one year,” he said. “So get back to that, and we will figure it out.”
The Wolves were far from a finished product on Thursday. Still, they looked reminiscent of the team that went on a Western Conference Finals run last season. They fought on defense and turned that aggression into offense in clutch time. More importantly, Edwards and Randle gave Wolves fans a reason to be excited about their pairing.
Minnesota returns home on Saturday to play against the Toronto Raptors, who the Cleveland Cavaliers blew out by 30 points in their season opener and are on the tail end of a back-to-back. The Wolves have some wind in their sales after beating Sacramento, and they will make their Target Center debut in front of a sell-out crowd, 11,000 of which will be at roughly every game this year.
No. 30 jerseys with “RANDLE” spelled on the back will most likely be hanging in the team store on Saturday, replacing where No. 32 hung for nearly a decade. Randle gave his new fanbase a reason to be optimistic. Now, he needs to build on the performance and give those fans a reason to consider purchasing a No. 30 jersey after the home opener.
