Want the latest Bay Area sports news delivered to your inbox? Sign up here to receive regular email blasts, plus “The Dime,” our twice-weekly sports newsletter.
Like in Game 3, the Warriors were hanging tough. They’d already proved that this isn’t the type of team to roll over, despite missing Steph Curry. They led at halftime and had Jonathan Kuminga breaking the paint at will for a second game in a row.
But then Anthony Edwards and the Timberwolves ended the game with a third-quarter explosion. It was the type of avalanche the best Warriors teams detonated on opponents for the past decade.
Edwards poured in 16 points in a third quarter the Wolves won 39-17 en route to a 117-110 final score that didn’t fully capture the nature of Minnesota’s second-half dominance. Edwards hit three 3-pointers and went 6-for-8 from the floor after an impassioned halftime speech from Minnesota head coach Chris Finch.
Edwards quite possibly shut down the Chase Center for the year in the process. Behind his 30 points and Julius Randle’s battering-ram 31 points, the Timberwolves put the Warriors’ season on the brink.
Subscribe to The Dime
News, gossip, and inside-the-locker-room access for Bay Area sports fans, every Friday and Monday.
After Minnesota took a 3-1 series lead, Golden State now faces elimination in Game 5 on Wednesday at the Target Center.
“The next game is do-or-die,” said Kuminga, who finished with a team-high 23 points. “If we get that one, everything’s going to be settled down. It’s a big one. We’ve just got to go out there and figure out how to get it.”
It was the third straight game the Warriors lost without Steph Curry, who has been sidelined with a hamstring strain he suffered early in Game 1.
Led by Kuminga and a locked-in defensive effort, the Warriors carried a 60-58 lead into halftime. But Edwards beat the halftime buzzer with a 30-footer over the outstretched arms of both Gary Payton II and Draymond Green — the Warriors’ best two on-ball defenders.
That shot, and the halftime scene in the visitor’s locker room, got Edwards going.
“At halftime, coach came in and just said we’re playing like we already won the series pretty much, and I don’t really like that,” Edwards said postgame. “I didn’t like how we were playing overall, and I didn’t like how I was playing individually. I know I had to pick it up.”
Early in the third quarter, Edwards sank a corner 3-pointer on a second chance-opportunity. He levitated in the air over three Warriors defenders at the rim to convert an and-1 with his left hand. Then he sank consecutive threes, including a step-back in transition. A 66-66 tie turned into an 80-68 blowout faster than Edwards could say, “Believe that.”
Steve Kerr called a pair of timeouts to try to halt Minnesota’s momentum. He tried a lineup without a traditional point guard, to no avail. There were no answers. The Timberwolves were due for a game like this, and it came all at once.
The Wolves shot 65% from the field and 6-for-12 from deep in the quarter while also forcing six Warriors turnovers.
“We just lost our ability to connect the game there in that third quarter, and they got loose and that was the difference in the game,” Kerr said.
Without Curry, the Warriors are at a talent deficit. They won Game 1 off sheer adrenaline. They kept Game 3 close with 63 combined points from Jimmy Butler and Kuminga.
But Butler’s best shot was that Game 3 loss, when he poured in 33 tough points. On Monday he was much more passive. Instead of forcing the issue like Golden State needs him to, he passed out of traffic and took only nine field goals (and none in the fourth quarter). Golden State got outscored by 30 points in his 34 minutes.
The Warriors needed everybody to step up in Curry’s absence, and they haven’t received enough support out of their role players. Brandin Podziemski is 9-for-40 (22.5%) from the field in the series, Moses Moody and Quinten Post have fallen out of the rotation, and Gary Payton II has been largely ineffective.
That’s a tough combination against a team with Edwards, who is on the verge of leading Minnesota to back-to-back conference finals berths. The only man in the building capable of matching Edwards was sitting on the Warriors’ bench in a red starter jacket, his left hamstring not yet healed enough even for a re-evaluation.
On Wednesday, the day of Game 5, Curry and the training staff will re-evaluate his injury. But given his rehab process, he’s not expected to be cleared immediately. That doesn’t mean he won’t try.
“If he’s in a place where he can play, I’m sure he will,” Green said. “Him and Rick (Celebrini) and everybody will figure that out. But we don’t need Superman. Gotta play the long game. If he can, we know he will. But there’s no pressure. We’ve got to figure out how to win whether he plays or not.”
The Warriors needed to win one of the two games at home to extend the series long enough for a possible Curry return — barring a surprise clearance. Edwards doesn’t plan on opening that window.
His third-quarter explosion was downright Curry-esque. He was in that type of zone. He only needed nine minutes to fill it up and flip the game.
“It’s the best feeling ever,” Edwards said.
During pregame warmups, the endearing Timberwolves superstar briefly practiced Curry’s “Night-Night” celebration.
Then he may have turned the lights out in Chase Center, too.