{"id":129212,"date":"2025-03-17T17:22:45","date_gmt":"2025-03-17T21:22:45","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/?p=129212"},"modified":"2025-03-17T17:22:45","modified_gmt":"2025-03-17T21:22:45","slug":"timberwolves-star-anthony-edwards-credits-chris-finch","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/2025\/03\/17\/timberwolves-star-anthony-edwards-credits-chris-finch\/","title":{"rendered":"Superhuman Timberwolves Star Credits Coach For Recent Surge"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span data-preserver-spaces=\"true\">It&#8217;s too late for the\u00a0<\/span><a class=\"editor-rtfLink\" href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/2025\/03\/14\/minnesota-timberwolves-unwilling-trade-jaden-mcdaniels-kevin-durant\/\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_self\"><span data-preserver-spaces=\"true\">Minnesota Timberwolves<\/span><\/a><span data-preserver-spaces=\"true\">\u00a0to take back the trade that sent\u00a0<\/span><a class=\"editor-rtfLink\" href=\"https:\/\/www.basketball-reference.com\/players\/t\/townska01.html\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"><span data-preserver-spaces=\"true\">Karl-Anthony Towns<\/span><\/a><span data-preserver-spaces=\"true\">\u00a0to the New York Knicks in exchange for\u00a0<\/span><a class=\"editor-rtfLink\" href=\"https:\/\/www.basketball-reference.com\/players\/r\/randlju01.html\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"><span data-preserver-spaces=\"true\">Julius Randle<\/span><\/a><span data-preserver-spaces=\"true\">\u00a0and\u00a0<\/span><a class=\"editor-rtfLink\" href=\"https:\/\/www.basketball-reference.com\/players\/d\/divindo01.html\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"><span data-preserver-spaces=\"true\">Donte DiVincenzo<\/span><\/a><span data-preserver-spaces=\"true\">. Minnesota is stuck with that decision, and this season has seen them start to pay for it. Giving up Towns was likely a mistake Minnesota would like back, as the up-and-down season exposed some significant weaknesses in the roster. That said, Timberwolves star\u00a0<\/span><a class=\"editor-rtfLink\" href=\"https:\/\/www.basketball-reference.com\/players\/e\/edwaran01.html\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"><span data-preserver-spaces=\"true\">Anthony Edwards<\/span><\/a><span data-preserver-spaces=\"true\">\u00a0has his squad back in the race,\u00a0<\/span><a class=\"editor-rtfLink\" href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/2025\/03\/15\/minnesota-timberwolves-win-streak\/\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_self\"><span data-preserver-spaces=\"true\">currently riding an eight-game win streak<\/span><\/a><span data-preserver-spaces=\"true\">\u00a0with a chance to extend it to nine tonight when they host the Indiana Pacers, another hot team of late. As for Minnesota&#8217;s recent turnaround, all the credit can&#8217;t fall on the players, as Edwards explains. Instead, much of the credit lies at the feet of a non-player.<\/span><\/p>\n<h2>Superhuman Timberwolves Star Credits Coach For Recent Surge<\/h2>\n<h3>Minnesota Timberwolves HC Chris Finch Lit A Fire Underneath Star Anthony Edwards and Co.<\/h3>\n<p><span data-preserver-spaces=\"true\">Chris Finch is regarded as one of the top coaches in the NBA, plus, he&#8217;s highly respected by his players. Antman is one of them, considering his recent praise for his head coach following a romp over the Utah Jazz over the weekend. The win improved the Timberwolves to 40-29 on the season with 13 games left on the schedule. The win lands them right on the heels of the\u00a0<\/span><a class=\"editor-rtfLink\" href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/2025\/03\/16\/steve-kerr-warriors-record\/\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_self\"><span data-preserver-spaces=\"true\">Golden State Warriors<\/span><\/a><span data-preserver-spaces=\"true\">\u00a0for the sixth seed. Surpassing them would take the Warriors dropping some games, although, at this point, the Warriors aren&#8217;t dropping any games. Still, Minnesota has time to leapfrog a few teams as long as they keep winning games. Their eight-game W streak has them one seed outside a playoff spot, and the turnaround <\/span><span data-preserver-spaces=\"true\">apparently<\/span><span data-preserver-spaces=\"true\"> happened when Finch proposed a challenge to his team after a win in January. However, according to Edwards, the challenge was delivered with anger more than anything else (<\/span><a class=\"editor-rtfLink\" href=\"https:\/\/x.com\/DaneMooreNBA\/status\/1901458688474530117?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1901458688474530117%7Ctwgr%5E0095cce559b333210eb4a9d283bbbb34176f8173%7Ctwcon%5Es1_&amp;ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fnbaanalysis.net%2Fanthony-edwards-picks-out-exact-words-chris-finch-said-to-unleash-timberwolves-playoff-mode-now-on-8-game-win-streak%2F\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"><span data-preserver-spaces=\"true\">Twitter link<\/span><\/a><span data-preserver-spaces=\"true\">).<\/span><\/p>\n<p><em>\u201cIt\u2019s been easier now that we got our whole team back. Everyone has the same mentality. I\u2019m thinking of Phoenix, Finchy had a great meeting.&#8221; <\/em>Edwards continued<em>, &#8220;He said, \u2018Either we\u2019re gonna come together as a team and push for the Playoffs, or we\u2019re gonna look for individual stats and accolades.<\/em> Not be a team, lose the games we supposed to win, and be fighting for a playoff position.\u00a0I think we\u2019re all locked in right now collectively. It looks good.\u201d<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\">\n<p dir=\"ltr\" lang=\"en\">A real turning point of the season for the Wolves was a very angry film session\/meeting led by Chris Finch on January 29th.<\/p>\n<p>Randle after the game that night &#8212; a game Finch got ejected from &#8212; said &#8220;we should have seen him that morning&#8221;. Alexander-Walker said Finch &#8220;woke up that\u2026 <a  href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/9zY7SCQ5pc\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">https:\/\/t.co\/9zY7SCQ5pc<\/a> <a  href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/2hUawQAgjZ\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">pic.twitter.com\/2hUawQAgjZ<\/a><\/p>\n<p>\u2014 Dane Moore (@DaneMooreNBA) <a  href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/DaneMooreNBA\/status\/1901458688474530117?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">March 17, 2025<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<h3>Whatever It Takes<\/h3>\n<p>A coach will not often light his locker room up following a win. He might go to the podium after the game and talk about the negative aspects of a game, even after a win. However, Edward&#8217;s explanation tells a different story. Whatever else Finch might have said in that team meeting, if there was more, did the job, and that&#8217;s his job. As a result, the Timberwolves have kicked things into gear, and Edwards too. This may be a sign of what Minnesota can look like sans KAT. This may be a sign that Edwards is becoming the MVP-type leader he is capable of.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>\u00a9 Winslow Townson-Imagn Images<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>It&#8217;s too late for the\u00a0Minnesota Timberwolves\u00a0to take back the trade that sent\u00a0Karl-Anthony Towns\u00a0to the New York Knicks in exchange for\u00a0Julius Randle\u00a0and\u00a0Donte DiVincenzo. Minnesota is stuck with that decision, and this season has seen them start to pay for it. Giving up Towns was likely a mistake Minnesota would like back, as the up-and-down season exposed [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5081,"featured_media":129215,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"no","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1608,21,62],"tags":[2109,1530,510,213],"class_list":["post-129212","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-basketball","category-timberwolves","category-nba","tag-anthony-edwards","tag-donte-divencenzo","tag-julius-randle","tag-karl-anthony-towns"],"modified_by":"Aaron J Zacharias","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/129212","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5081"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=129212"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/129212\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":129225,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/129212\/revisions\/129225"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/129215"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=129212"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=129212"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=129212"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}