The 2024 NBA postseason rolls into the second round on Saturday. The reigning champion Denver Nuggets hosted the Minnesota Timberwolves in a much-anticipated matchup of the familiar foes in the Western Conference semifinals. A year ago, Denver needed just five games to dispatch Minnesota in the first round of the playoffs, however, this time it was the Timberwolves coming out on top in Game 1.
In order to get here, the No. 3-seed Wolves pulled off an impressive sweep of the No. 6-seed Suns in the first round, while the No. 2-seed Nuggets ousted the No. 7-seed Lakers in five games to advance. Anthony Edwards has become the Wolves' go-to scoring option as he's averaged 31 points, eight rebounds and six assists in the 2024 playoffs. Here are the biggest takeaways from Minnesota's Game 1 upset:
Nuggets vs. Timberwolves -- Game 1 score:
- Timberwolves 106, Nuggets 99 (MIN leads series 1-0)
Is Anthony Edwards going to be the best player in this series?
Nikola Jokic is the best player in the world. It's one of those statements that we tend to treat as fact throughout a season without real re-examination. He's going to win MVP. He's the reigning Finals MVP. He's in the middle of a historically dominant run. So it stands to reason that he's the best player in the series, right?
Well, Anthony Edwards had something to say about that on Saturday. His 43 points were a new career playoff-high. He and Kobe Bryant are now the only two players age 22 or younger to score 40 in back-to-back playoff games. Edwards defended Jamal Murray for a decent amount of his scoreless first half. When Minnesota needed big buckets to ice things in the fourth quarter, it was Edwards contorting his body and nailing jumper after jumper against every layer of help-defense Denver threw his way.
None of this is to suggest Jokic played poorly. He didn't, and remember, he's facing a No. 1 defense and the presumptive Defensive Player of the Year. You can't exactly criticize 32 points, nine assists and eight rebounds. Jokic was more or less his usual self.
But Edwards has risen to another level. He's now scored 35 or more three times in a row... all on the road. He didn't just beat Jokic, he did so under Jokic's favored conditions. The Nuggets trailed the Los Angeles Lakers at halftime of all five of their first-round games and in the fourth quarter of three of their wins. It didn't matter because Denver, for the past two seasons, has executed flawlessly on both ends of the court in clutch situations.
The fourth quarter belonged to Edwards on Saturday. If he can make contested shots at the same rate that Jokic creates easy ones, this series is going to come down to the defenses, and Minnesota's has a real advantage on that front. Denver's path to a victory in this series, especially after losing home-court advantage, starts with Jokic being the best player in the world. He wasn't on Saturday. He wasn't even the best player on the court. He was his usual self. Meanwhile, Edwards is evolving right before our eyes.
Which Murray is Denver getting?
Lost in the hoopla of Murray's two game-winners against the Lakers was the fact that he shot below 40% from the field on all of his other shots. He is very clearly physically compromised right now with a calf injury. Reports indicated that he struggled through practice this week as Denver prepared for Minnesota. He proceeded to go scoreless in the first half before stepping up to score 17 in the second.
The Timberwolves lightened up a bit on Murray defensively in the second half. After Edwards and Jaden McDaniels spent the entire first half attached to his hip, Minnesota grew a bit more comfortable conceding switches and letting him walk into jumpers. He got into a bit of a rhythm and looked a bit more like the Jamal Murray we know in those last two quarters.
But Edwards and McDaniels aren't going anywhere, and neither is Nickeil Alexander-Walker. Edwards is especially frustrating because he and Mike Conley made a point of running guard-guard pick-and-rolls in this game specifically to force Murray to play on-ball defense with that injured calf. The Timberwolves aren't the Lakers. They have all of the tools that they need to frustrate a hobbled Murray, and if Murray can't be the dominant scorer he was during last year's title run, or even the late-game finisher that he was against the Lakers, Denver is going to lose this series.
Micah Nori erases all doubts
How critical is a coaching injury, really? We don't know because it's not something we frequently deal with. Chris Finch was on the bench. He was obviously involved in the game-planning process. He was available to the team. But Micah Nori was nominally the acting coach. He was the one standing up, communicating with players and running huddles. It's unclear who was making the final decisions on substitutions, timeouts and challenges, and that sort of uncertainty means quite a bit in a game of this magnitude.
Whatever system Nori and Finch arranged went off without a hitch in Game 1. Minnesota navigated its victory comfortably. There weren't too many especially difficult game-management decisions when it came to timeouts or challenges, but one notably well-handled decision came on the lineup front in the fourth quarter. Karl-Anthony Towns spent most of the final frame on the bench in foul trouble, and in his place, Naz Reid scored 14 of his 16 points. With around three minutes remaining, the Timberwolves had to decide whether to stick with Reid or bring back Towns. They chose their All-Star, and he helped them seal the win.
In a perfect world, Finch would be handling all of his typical duties. He was a Coach of the Year finalist for a reason. But whatever Minnesota devised to make his life easier clearly worked. If Nori has to stand in his place all series, we now have reason to believe the Timberwolves will be just fine.
