During the course of the regular season, Donte DiVincenzo had his inconsistencies. His confidence would never wane, though, and it wouldn’t matter if he missed five straight from beyond the arc. If The Big Ragu found himself an open look, he believed the next one was going in.
You could feel the air come out of the arena when DiVincenzo went down barely a minute into the game with a non-contact injury in Game 4 of the opening round.
It looked serious, and shortly after, it was confirmed that he sustained a torn Achilles tendon. The Minnesota Timberwolves absolutely miss his leadership, and after struggling once again from 3-point distance in Game 5 of their series against the San Antonio Spurs, they miss Donte’s long-range shooting.Â
Timberwolves haven’t knocked down threes consistently all seriesÂ
Nine makes in 33 attempts. That equates to just 27.3 percent, and that was the Timberwolves’ 3-point shooting performance in Game 5. Other than Naz Reid and Jaden McDaniels (both went 3-for-7), the rest of the team went an atrocious 3-for-19.
It was known coming into the series against the Spurs that life would be much more difficult trying to drive into the paint than it was against the Denver Nuggets. Outside shooting would be an important factor to determine if Minnesota would be able to advance, and it hasn’t gone well through the first 5 outings.
Other than making 14 in Game 3, the Wolves have not made more than 10 3-pointers in the other four contests. Minnesota was about league average in 3-point makes during the regular season with 13.6 per contest, but that all came with DiVincenzo.
DiVo hit countless big-time shots from deep in a regular season where he didn’t miss a single game. Altogether, he connected on 244, the second-most in team history, only behind Anthony Edwards in 2024-25. In 63 out of 82 games, DiVincenzo made multiple 3s.
Prior to his catastrophic injury against Denver, DiVincenzo was knocking them down with consistency against the Nuggets. The 29-year-old made half of his 3-point tries (11-for-22) in the first three games of the opening round.
Unfortunately for the Timberwolves, their top 3-point marksman from the regular season won’t be returning for a while. With Minnesota being just one loss away from elimination, you have to wonder if the series would have gone differently if the Spurs had to deal with the threat of DiVincenzo from long distance.
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