The Spurs defeat the Timberwolves, 139-109, to win the series 4-2, advancing to challenge OKC in the WCF.
You watch NBA games long enough and you’ll invariably see something you’ve never seen before. Late Friday night, it was this: Minnesota’s Anthony Edwards walking to the other end of the court at Target Center, in hoodie and sweats, to congratulate the San Antonio Spurs on their 4-2 series victory.
With eight minutes left to play in the game.
Edwards’ premature capitulation was prompted by San Antonio routing his Timberwolves for the second consecutive game in their West semifinals series. This one was wire-to-wire, a 139-109 spanking that looked even worse – 128-95 at 8:01 of the fourth quarter – when both coaches pulled their rotation guys and Edwards made his stroll to the visitors’ bench.
There was no rush, of course, and some old-school coaches and players might have been triggered by Edwards’ unusually early white flag. But truth can be a pretty effective defense: The Wolves were cooked at that point. They wound up getting outscored by 59 points in Games 5 and 6 combined. And they didn’t even win a quarter after Game 4.
This was the third straight postseason in which Minnesota trailed by at least 30 points in their elimination game, against Dallas, OKC and now San Antonio. Garbage time in their playoff finales means, at the very least, the Wolves do not save their best for last.
The Spurs, on the other hand, are humming as they advance to the Western Conference Finals, which tip off in Oklahoma City on Monday (8:30 ET, NBC/Peacock).
Here are four takeaways from a 4-2 series victory:
1. The Spurs are right on time
Truth be told, even some of the San Antonio players began this season with their sights set a little lower. From 22 victories in 2023-24 to 34 last season, something in the 40s would have gotten the young Spurs above .500, a worthy milestone in their development, and either an assured low seed in the 2026 NBA Playoffs or a favored spot in the SoFi Play-In Tournament.
Yeah, well, they won 62. Only the defending champions in OKC won more, and the Spurs nailed down the West’s No. 2 seed. Did it with a core, too, of players age 25 or younger, including center Victor Wembanyama and guards Stephon Castle, Dylan Harper, Devin Vassell and Julian Champagnie; they have grown up a lot in just 11 playoff games.
“Ahead of schedule, what?” said coach Mitch Johnson. “I understand the general expectations of October are not necessarily aligned with where we are right now. So I would guess by general consensus we’re ahead of that schedule. But we never talked about what we were going to be or what we were going to do.
“We just knew we had a lot of potential and we were going to try to be the best team we could be. Those guys in that locker room have given themselves to the team and each other. It’s been pretty fun when you see a group of guys [do that].”
The last time San Antonio reached the West Finals, back in 2017, most of these guys were in junior high or high school. Heck, even Johnson was only 30. But the Spurs dominated Portland in the first round, then handled a Minnesota team that had reached the conference finals the past two seasons. Now they face Oklahoma City … against whom they went 5-1 in this most precocious season.
When you’ve got Wembanyama on board, a growth spurt should surprise no one.
2. Wolves ran out of adjustments
Conventional wisdom says that the longer a series lasts, the more the outcome will swing on execution rather than any coaching tweaks or maneuvers held in reserve.
This six-gamer largely stayed true to that form. San Antonio broke the 2-2 tie by winning Game 5 by 29 points, sparked by blistering early work from Wembanyama. Game 6 stuck to the script, a 30-point Spurs victory in which the biggest difference was the winners’ early source of energy: Castle scored 14 of his game-high 32 points in the first quarter, a direct result of Wolves coach Chris Finch loading up on Wembanyama at the risk of … exactly what happened.
Stephon Castle leads the Spurs with 32 points, 11 rebounds in a Game 6 closeout victory.
Castle, the NBA’s Rookie of the Year last season, has improved considerably since then. His former flaw – outside shooting – looked like a strength Friday. Castle hit his first four 3-pointers, finished 5-for-7 from the arc and shot 11-for-16 overall while adding 11 rebounds and six assists.
“We flipped the matchups around and tried to do some things to maybe slow down their start,” Finch said. “But it allowed Castle to get hot early. You know, that certainly wasn’t the plan, though we knew we’d be giving up some clean looks to him.”
3. An early offseason for Edwards
Six NBA seasons, five NBA postseasons – as Wolves players go, that’s no small achievement. Only Kevin Garnett, going eight consecutive times after his rookie season, can claim more. But this time Edwards’ stroll into summer comes one round earlier than in 2024 or 2025, a clear backpedal from where he and his teammates want to go.
The Wolves shooting star scored 24 points in Game 6 but needed 26 shots to get there. He was the focus of San Antonio’s double-teams for much of the series and played on knees that were less than 100%, though he complained about none of it.
Still, Edwards appeared in a career-low 61 games, short of the league minimum to earn All-NBA or awards consideration. He’ll turn 25 in August, still ridiculously young given his resume, but he has reached a point where he plans to start taking his offseason strength and conditioning work even more seriously. First for staying healthy, second for any competitive edge his talents don’t naturally provide.
It seemed, too, in the minutes after Friday’s crushing defeat that Edwards saw how the long runway to the playoffs can make or break a team’s spring ambitions.
The Wolves finished 49-33 this season, same as a year ago and still short of their 56-26 mark two years ago. Much like Orlando in the East, Minnesota meandered below their potential through the first 82 and acted as if they could flip a switch for the playoffs. Didn’t work. Rarely does.
“We’ve just got to listen to the coaches,” Edwards said. “We had a hard time of like processing stuff and going out there and doing it. We tried to do stuff on our own. I think that’s our problem.
“You’re supposed to build championship habits during the regular season.”
Wolves basketball boss has to address needs and plug holes after seeing Rudy Gobert, Julius Randle, Mike Conley and Donte DiVincenzo (Achilles rupture) go down or fall short in recent weeks. But helping Edwards flourish – and the Ant Man helping himself and his teammates with another dose of maturity – remains Minnesota’s No. 1 priority.
4. A ‘Finals’ before the Finals
With all due respect to the Knicks and either the Cavaliers or the Pistons, many NBA fans will view the winner of the West Finals as a likely championship favorite regardless of the ensuing matchup.
The Thunder and the Spurs had the two best records all season and stayed in lockstep atop the standings all year. Two of the three MVP finalists will be featured in the showdown that begins Monday, when OKC’s Shai Gilgeous-Alexander will bring his tricky mid-range game within reach of Wembanyama’s long sleeve length.
Both teams are deep enough to play multiple combinations and various styles. OKC has more experience but the Spurs have that youthful advantage of not really knowing what they don’t know. And while the Thunder believe they’ll do better than winning once in six tries vs. San Antonio, they also know from watching their next opponent that the steel of these first two rounds has sharped the Spurs.
“We have a few guys on our team who are just that talented and … they take over at times. The talent pops and they get to just have fun,” Johnson said. “It’s pretty rewarding as a coach just to watch. When they have the right approach and play with the fundamentals needed at this level to execute things, they have the talent to take it to another level.”
Said Wembanyama: “The words ‘conference finals’ just seem surreal right now.”
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Steve Aschburner has written about the NBA since 1980. You can e-mail him here, find his archive here and follow him on X.