Minnesota Timberwolves at Oklahoma City Thunder
Date: November 26th, 2025
Time: 6:30 PM CST
Location: Paycom Center
Television Coverage: ESPN
Radio Coverage: KFAN FM, Wolves App, iHeart Radio
There are collapse losses, and then there are Timberwolves collapse losses. These are the kind of defeats you can show to a psychologist and they’ll diagnose them as collective trauma. What we saw against Sacramento wasn’t a trap game, it was an utter self-own. Everyone in the arena knew exactly what was waiting on the floor: a decimated Kings roster, missing Domantas Sabonis, held together with duct tape and prayer, sitting there begging to be put away early so the Wolves could coast into Thanksgiving Eve with fresh legs and a clean conscience.
And the Wolves did what they always do in that situation: they found the banana peel, stepped directly on it, and launched themselves into a canyon like Wile E. Coyote.
You can’t even call it a choke. A choke is missing two free throws. A choke is fumbling a defensive rebound. What Minnesota pulled off was an Olympic-level compilation of everything that makes this franchise infuriating. An eight-point lead evaporated in under sixty seconds against Phoenix. It was the kind of late-game malpractice you should only see in a YMCA league when everyone’s just there to get cardio. And somehow the Timberwolves looked at that disaster, nodded approvingly, and said: “Yeah, let’s run that one back.”
Against Sacramento, they blew a late double-digit lead the exact same way: porous defense, isolation hero ball, and turnovers that would make a Madden CPU blush. It was the sequel nobody asked for, complete with the same twist ending: Wolves fans sitting in stunned silence staring at the scoreboard and questioning their life choices.
And so here we are: 10–7 without a signature win against a team above .500. You can talk excuses all you want — Ant’s hamstring, back-to-backs, bad whistles, travel fatigue — none of it matters when you hand games to Phoenix and Sacramento like they’re Black Friday doorbusters
Which is why Wednesday night in Oklahoma City isn’t “just another road game.” It isn’t even just an NBA Cup date. It’s something far bigger and way more consequential. This is the Wolves’ real chance at redemption. This is a chance to walk back into the arena where their season ended last May and rewrite the narrative they’ve been casually speed-running into disaster.
Landing in Group A was supposed to be Minnesota’s golden ticket: 3 Cup qualifiers vs. inferior teams (Jazz, Kings, Suns) to cruise to 3–0 before squaring off with the Thunder for the group crown. Instead, they once again face elimination before the bracket even starts. The meltdown in Phoenix essentially took “win the group” off the table. Now the Wolves’ path looks like a math proof written in blood: beat OKC or the Cup dreams flatline. No style points, no excuses, no “we’ll get ‘em next year.” Just win.
A victory in Oklahoma City changes everything. It gets you to 11–7, it gives you your first signature win against a team that actually matters, and it pushes your +53 point differential further towards the Wild Card threshold, the only backdoor entry the Wolves still control. It’s revenge. It’s relevance. It’s season-defining. If Minnesota walks into that arena and beats the one-loss defending champs on their floor, it resets the entire narrative.
Lose, and it’s not back to the drawing board. It’s back to that familiar Timberwolves purgatory, the “better than bad, worse than serious” club.
This isn’t about a Cup. It’s not even about November standings.
It’s about who this franchise wants to be.
1. Move the ball and protect it.
We know exactly how Minnesota loses these games because they’ve handed us the blueprint twice in four days. Julius Randall pounding the air out of the ball like he’s trying to tenderize it. Anthony Edwards dribbling into double teams and deciding that yes, the only person on Earth who can shoot the next possession is Anthony Edwards. Everyone else standing around like NPCs.
That’s how the Kings caught them. That’s how Phoenix caught them. And it’s exactly what Oklahoma City wants.
Fittingly, the Timberwolves are at their best when they play like a cohesive pack: Ant slashing into the paint and kicking to McDaniels in the corner. Randall drawing the second defender and creating the skip pass to Donte DiVincenzo. Naz Reid hunting mismatches while Rudy cleans the glass and gobbles up putbacks. When Minnesota plays like that, the Wolves look like one of the five best teams in basketball.
The ball has to move, and not just “we swung it once to the weak side”. There needs to be actual offensive orchestration. Thunder rotations are disciplined and razor-sharp. You stagnate? They feast. The Wolves simply cannot play “my turn, your turn” basketball.
They have to play “our turn.”
It’s the only way they win.
2. Contain SGA without fouling like you’re trying to set NBA records.
Shai Gilgeous-Alexander isn’t just hot. He’s on an all-time heater. And unlike other stars, SGA isn’t just scoring, he’s a magician who weaponizes the whistle. He lives in the mid-range, manipulates contact, and walks to the free-throw line like he has preferred customer status.
The Wolves have the personnel to contain him in McDaniels, Clark, and Edwards. They even have the blueprint: February’s comeback game where Minnesota blitzed Shai at halfcourt, forced other Thunder players to initiate offense, and lived with the results.
There are only two certainties in this matchup:
- If Jaden McDaniels picks up two fouls in the first seven minutes, we are dead.
- If Shea is taking 15+ free throws, we are also dead.
This isn’t a “guard him straight up and hope.” This is a “deny him the ball, trap the pick-and-roll, rotate aggressively, and dare someone else to beat you” game.
3. Win the hustle war. Every loose ball, every board, every scrap.
Chet Holmgren and Isaiah Hartenstein aren’t glamorous, but they are a nightmare duo because they do all the stuff Minnesota has become suddenly allergic to:
- contest shots
- punch out loose rebounds
- punish lazy spacing
- destroy you with second-chance points
Minnesota has the bodies in Rudy, Julius, and Naz. They have the physicality advantage. They have the bulk. They absolutely must play like it.
You cannot give OKC free extra possessions on the boards. You cannot let Chet tip balls around the cylinder. You cannot give the Thunder runway dunks because eight guys stared at the rebound like they misplaced their glasses.
The Wolves have become weirdly passive in the paint, losing key rebounds and allowing teams like the Kings to dunk all over them. If it’s more of the same against the Thunder? That’s how you get your lunch stolen on national TV.
4. The Big Three needs to be the Big Three — or don’t even bother.
Ant + Julius + McDaniels – when those three cook, the Wolves are a monster nobody can handle. When one of them disappears, the whole team folds like a cheap camping chair.
- McDaniels had his first “piss-poor” night of the season versus Sacramento — 6 points, no impact — and look what happened.
- Julius drifted back into ISO purgatory, stopped facilitating, and the offense hardened into cement.
- Edwards scored 41… but also passed like he was allergic to the idea of sharing down the stretch.
OKC isn’t Sacramento. They will punish any imbalance.
McDaniels has to be aggressive. Attack the rim. Finish at the cup. Hit threes. He cannot just expend every ounce of energy on SGA and leave bricks behind on offense. Minnesota is not built to win that way.
Randall must be the steady hand he was all through to start the season. He needs to give that well-balanced 20–10–10 energy, and not go into “I got this” mode.
And Edwards? This is the night he finds out if he’s a superstar or a mixtape.
Don’t hunt heat-check threes. Don’t barrel into quadruple coverage. Attack, draw contact, get to the line, make OKC adjust, and then punish them with patience.
Don’t try to be the hero. Just be the guy who wins the game.
This isn’t a November game. This isn’t a random stop on the schedule. This is a referendum.
Beat OKC on their floor, and everything changes. You go from a punchline that’s 0–6 vs. winning teams to a contender who finally grabbed their signature moment. You flip the narrative: no longer the bully who beats up the weak, but the team that can stare down the league’s best and throw the first punch. You keep the Cup dream alive. You get your revenge. You show that these two meltdowns were glitches, not gospel.
Lose? You become exactly what the skeptics say you are: A play-in team in contender’s clothing. A roster full of “almosts.” A franchise still asking permission to sit at the adult table.
There are 82 games in a season, but only a handful that define who you are. This is one of them.
The Wolves can show the league they’ve grown up, or they can walk into OKC like every Wolves team that came before, hand the Thunder the game, and start measuring curtain rods for their new home in the 7–10 zone of the standings.
It’s all sitting there on the table: Revenge. Redemption. Relevance.
Wednesday night tells us which Wolves team is real and whether this is a beginning… or just another chapter in the same story we’ve read for 37 years.
