Timberwolves’ Chris Finch calls out Anthony Edwards after Game 1 loss vs. Warriors
Chris Finch called out Anthony Edwards and challenged him to be better after the Timberwolves lost Game 1 against the Warriors.
The Minnesota Timberwolves had a golden opportunity to take a 1-0 series lead on Tuesday night against the Golden State Warriors, but they squandered it with a lifeless offensive performance in a 99-88 loss.
After Stephen Curry left the game in the second quarter with a hamstring injury, the Timberwolves seemed poised to come back and run away with the win. However, even as Golden State’s offense struggled to score outside of getting Buddy Hield free on the perimeter, Minnesota also failed to get good looks and knock down the ones it found.
After the game, Timberwolves head coach Chris Finch made sure there was no mistaking that it starts with Anthony Edwards and that the superstar has to be better if the team wants to see better results, via Jon Krawczynski of The Athletic.
“You’re the leader of the team,” Finch said postgame. “You have to come out and set the tone.”
Finch eventually went into more detail, highlighting how the team’s confidence was affected by its poor shooting and pointing at Edwards as the one who needs to lead the way to ensure that doesn’t happen, via ESPN’s Dave McMenamin.
“It starts with Anthony [Edwards],” Finch said. “You could see the light go out for a little while.”
It was an odd game for Edwards, who was obviously excited to finally get to play the Warriors in the playoffs. His final stat line looks good: 23 points and 14 rebounds on 9-for-22 shooting and 1-for-5 from 3-point range. However, a lot of those points came with the Wolves far behind in the fourth quarter.
When Minnesota was still in the game, Edwards was unusually passive and settled for too many jumpers early in the game. However, he discovered later in the game that he can get to the rim at will against Golden State, especially when he gets switches.
Edwards doesn’t usually have multiple bad playoff games in a row, so it’s reasonable to expect that he will have a much more productive outing in Game 2. Even if the Warriors don’t have Curry on the floor, Minnesota has to come out as the aggressor in order to even the series up at a game apiece and reset the momentum in this series.
Troy Finnegan is a Senior Editor and College Sports Lead at ClutchPoints. He graduated from the University of Colorado Boulder in 2023 with a degree in journalism and minors in communications and sports media, as well as a critical sports studies certificate.
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