Although the Oklahoma City Thunder routed the Minnesota Timberwolves 114-88 in Game 1 of the Western Conference finals on Tuesday, the Timberwolves still have an immense opportunity to steal the home-court advantage away from the NBA’s winningest team.
Minnesota has plenty of room for improvement heading into Game 2, starting with the play of Anthony Edwards. The star guard went just 5-of-13 from the field and scored only 18 points in Game 1, and he is expected to play much better moving forward.
On TNT’s “Inside the NBA,” Shaquille O’Neal said that Edwards needs to assert himself.
“Growing up as a fan, you see in moments like this where players take over, seeing Steph (Stephen Curry) do it, you see Hakeem [Olajuwon] do it, I’ve seen you do it, seen Magic [Johnson] do it,” O’Neal said. “I need Ant to take over. … I need him to step up. We’re talking about him being the new face of the league — these are the things we have to go through. I need to see him figure it out.”
Shaq wants to see Ant take over in Game 2 😤 pic.twitter.com/jcxWDUMnoM
— NBA on TNT (@NBAonTNT) May 22, 2025
Edwards is one of the NBA’s brightest and most exciting young stars. He has often been compared to Michael Jordan and Kobe Bryant because of his athleticism, his one-on-one skills and his immense chutzpah.
However, he has yet to show the consistency, especially in the playoffs, that Jordan and Bryant put forth.
In the previous series against the Golden State Warriors, Edwards scored 36 points in Game 3 and 30 points in Game 4, but he had no more than 23 points in each of the other three contests.
In Game 1 of this series, the Timberwolves, as a team, were as frigid as a January day in Minneapolis. They shot just 34.9% from the field and committed 19 turnovers, and they failed to score a single fast-break point. In earlier rounds, they did a magnificent job of scoring off their opponent’s turnovers.
The Thunder aren’t just the NBA’s best defensive team — they’re also very explosive offensively, and exceptionally deep. It will take an all-hands-on-deck effort for the Timberwolves to get past the Thunder, and Edwards will have to pull a huge amount of the weight.
Related: Anthony Edwards Dealt Punishment Amid Timberwolves’ Playoff Series
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