In Denver, Anthony Edwards scores 43, and the Timberwolves win the first game.

Another young talent could describe his performance against the reigning champions as a statement if you questioned him about what it felt like to enter their building and score a career-high 43 points in the first game of the second round, which ended 106-99.
If he was really in the mood, he might claim that the Minnesota Timberwolves’ acquisition of the Denver Nuggets’ home court on Saturday marked a dramatic change in the Western Conference’s power dynamics.

But Anthony Edwards of the Wolves isn’t like any other young talent in the game right now. He may not resemble any other young player in the history of the league.
When questioned about Minnesota advancing beyond the first round of the playoffs for the first time in twenty years, Edwards said, “It’s not about introducing ourselves to nobody, we know who we are.”. “We’re coming out and as long as we got each other’s backs, it don’t really matter what anybody else thinks.”
When Kevin Garnett and the Wolves defeated the Sacramento Kings in the second round of the 2004 NBA Playoffs, it was the lone conference finals participation in the franchise’s history. Edwards quipped that he may not even have been born yet.
Despite their previous playoff struggles, Wolves are now enjoying their time. According to ESPN Stats & Information research, Edwards has joined Kobe Bryant as the only other player in NBA postseason history with back-to-back 40-point games at the age of 22 or younger. They are now 5-0 in the playoffs, including their sweeping of the Phoenix Suns in the first round.
The most points ever scored by a player for the Wolves in a three-game stretch in playoffs history was Edward’s 119 during his past three playoff games. And he accomplished it on Saturday by outperforming Nikola Jokic, the current MVP of the NBA Finals and one of this year’s top three finalists for the MVP of the regular season.
“To be honest he’s a special player, I have huge respect for him, he can do everything on the floor,” Jokic remarked of Edwards. “You need to give him respect, how good and how talented he is.”
Despite his impressive final line of 32 points, 9 assists, 8 rebounds, and 3 steals, Jokic only shot 11 of 25 from the field (2 of 9 from 3) and committed a game-high seven turnovers. Upon being questioned about how he might improve against Karl-Anthony Towns, Rudy Gobert, and Naz Reid, the three-headed frontline of the Wolves in Game 2, he joked that he would need to “have a duplicate clone of myself.”
With seven rebounds, three assists, one steal, two blocks, and only one turnover, Edwards, on the other hand, went 17 for 29. Even more impressively, Second Spectrum reports that he went 7 for 10 on hotly contested jump shots in Game 1. He’s shooting the best in the NBA this playoffs at 53% on strongly contested shots.
Edwards gave gratitude to his teammates for the result, but he still showed deference to the opponent despite the difference in output between the two stars.
“Going against the best player in the world is always fun, going against the best team in the world is always fun,” Edwards said. “This evening, our lads competed. Thus, it is about my team, not about me individually. They also instill confidence in me.”
During the opening seven minutes of the first quarter, Edwards went 5-for-5 from the field, setting the tone for the Wolves’ 18-4 surge. After a strong comeback, the Nuggets led 44–40 at the half, limiting all Minnesota players save for Edwards to only 6-for-27 (22.2%) shooting. In the third quarter, the Wolves surged ahead once again. Edwards said he “didn’t do anything” and “was just out there running up and down,” while Mike Conley scored 11 of his 14 points and Karl-Anthony Towns went 5-for-5 for 11 of his 20 points.
The fourth was shared by Edwards and NBA Sixth Man of the Year Naz Reid. After going scoreless in the Wolves’ two regular season losses to Denver in the fourth quarter, Edwards ended with 12 points on 4-for-5 shooting. Reid sealed it with 14 of his 16 points in the fourth quarter, including 10 consecutive for the Wolves.
“For a guy like me who’s seen him grow from Day 1 to where he is now, I think he’s a superstar in the making if he’s not [already] now,” Reid said of Edwards. He is an amazing player as well as an amazing guy off the field. You want to be around this man.”
And as indicated by the “11” painted in large black numbers on the whiteboard in the visitor’s locker room at Ball Arena after the game, Minnesota intends to stay in the playoffs for a long time. It stands for the amount of victories the Wolves still have to earn in order to win their first-ever title this spring.
Gobert described Edwards as someone who “has been growing every day, he’s been getting more mature every single night.” “So it’s fun to be a part of.”

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