Can the Minnesota Timberwolves somehow stop the Denver Nuggernauts?

Why did the Minnesota Timberwolves end up as the exception on NBA Sunday?

After the second day of Round 1 competition in the NBA Playoffs, the scoreboard was lighting up with game after game of upsets. Lower-seeded teams were finding plenty of success on the road against higher-seeded teams. After the fifth-seeded New York Knicks overcame the fourth-seeded Cleveland Cavaliers on Saturday, the Los Angeles Lakers, the Miami Heat, and the Los Angeles Clippers overcame traveling and facing higher-seeded teams.

But when the Minnesota Timberwolves played the last first game of the NBA Playoffs, there was never a question about an upset victory. The Timberwolves played tough enough on defense, but the team’s top scorers simply were not scoring. No Timberwolves player put up 20+ points in this one.

Only four players scored in double digits, and two came off the bench to do so: Jaylen Nowell and Kyle Anderson. Anthony Edwards led the Timberwolves with 18 points, while Karl-Anthony Towns contributed with just 11 points.

The Timberwolves offense never showed up

The Timberwolves’ offense never got going. Either the player was a low-volume but high-percentage shooter, or a high-volume but low-percentage shooter. Either way, the Timberwolves only managed 80 points in a game where they held the heavily favored Denver Nuggets to 109 points on the road.

Of course, there are some extenuating circumstances involved that we cannot just sweep under the rug. For starters:

1. The Minnesota Timberwolves played in three highly competitive and exhausting games in the past week; Meanwhile, the Denver Nuggets had 0 games.
2. The Denver Nuggets rested at home for 7 days; Meanwhile, the Timberwolves have flown to Los Angeles and back and had flown to face the Nuggets in Denver, and that mile-high altitude (with thinner oxygen that takes time to acclimate to after arriving)
3. The top-seeded Denver Nuggets ended the 2022-23 NBA season as the top-seeded team in the NBA Western Conference for good reason. This is a team with plenty of continuity with the same core players. The Minnesota Timberwolves roster has been a complete kaleidoscope of various iterations,  Four of the team’s core players right now had only seven regular season games to work out chemistry, communication, and compatibility
4. The Timberwolves have struggled with injuries all season and competed in this game without SF Jaden McDaniels (hand) and C Naz Reid (wrist)

The Nuggets are a well-oiled machine right now, an NBA Juggernaut worthy of being called the Nuggernauts.

In the meantime, the Wolves are left scratching their heads trying to formulate a way to counterpunch effectively.