The Minnesota Timberwolves set individual and collective goals for themselves before the season began. One of those goals: Register more wins than last year before the All-Star Break.
Fewer than five weeks into 2021-22, they achieved that goal. By mid-February, they entered the season’s brief hiatus at 31-28. A year ago, they were 7-28 at the All-Star break. Weeks later, they’re 37-29 overall, good for seventh in the West, and 21-9 since Jan. 3. Their .561 win percentage is the franchise’s second-best mark since 2004-05, topped only by Jimmy Butler’s one-year cameo in 2017-18.
Proving integral to this 2022 turnaround is second-year forward Jaden McDaniels. Across those 30 games, the lanky, sprawling 6’9 wing is averaging 10.7 points, 3.7 rebounds, and 1.3 assists on 58 percent true shooting (.477/.350/.775 split).
McDaniels is one of Minnesota’s five 22-and-under rotation players. Head coach Chris Finch is in his first full season as the lead man. Even Karl-Anthony Towns (26), D’Angelo Russell (25), and Malik Beasley (25) are just now on the cusp of their primes.
“Doing little summer camps and things like that with (Finch) there showed that our chemistry was right. As a coach, he’s a laidback coach — like, he doesn’t give us no restrictions or anything,” McDaniels says. “He lets us play freely. So, I feel like that’s why we all come together so well.”
A youthful, prosperous era of Timberwolves basketball that distinguishes itself from nearly two decades of misfortune and losing appears in its infancy. McDaniels will be pivotal to those efforts, and the flames of positive development have been stoked this year.
Dating back to his rookie season, McDaniels garnered minutes because of his defensive chops and etched offensive utility by shooting 36.4 percent beyond the arc. Yet he’s showcasing significant strides off the dribble and rediscovering the outside jumper that hibernated early on this year — he hit on 26.8 percent from deep prior to Jan. 3. After 54 percent of his shots were triples last season, that rate is down to 46.3 percent this season. He’s also buried 56.4 percent of his twos, a jump from 54.4 percent as a rookie, merging both volume and efficiency in his uptick.
Attacking off the catch, he leverages his length and dexterous handle to glide through creases in the defense. The Timberwolves are also occasionally tapping into him as a second-side ball-handler. Amid their 21-9 surge, they lead the NBA in offensive rating. McDaniels’ ability to exploit gaps as a supporting cast member and diversify his contributions beyond stationary shooting are important.
McDaniels tells Dime he’s learning to be more patient with his decisions and reading the defense before acting. Last offseason, he received his first crack at Summer League — due to COVID-19, 2020 Summer League was canceled — and was afforded in-game opportunities to experiment when the final score was trivial.
“I remember last year, I would kind of play all fast and just be like a one-, two-dribble guy. So, during the summer, that was my thing, just to be able to dribble in the paint and create for others,” McDaniels says. “I know last year, I wasn’t really confident in doing those things off the dribble. But I feel like I’m more confident now.”
Most 6’9 wings do not tout the deft ball-handling of McDaniels. Many of the downhill forays included above are punctuated by slithery crossovers and the capacity to navigate busy windows off the dribble. With his intersection of handling and size, covering ground from the perimeter to the interior isn’t the laborious task it may be for many forwards of similar stature.
To enable these sorts of sequences, he focuses on maintaining balance by keeping his back and chest perpendicular with the ground. The aim is to avoid hunching over the ball, which was previously a problem, he says. Now, every successful drive and dribble move bolster his self-belief.
Sometimes, he’ll watch film and notice opportunities in which he didn’t take advantage of extra stride or dribble available to him. Other times, the tape reveals situations where a dribble move worked, but he failed to recognize it in the moment, or reminds him of counters he hasn’t pulled out recently.
The confidence to attempt these audacious plays and deviate away from spot-up shooting stems from his coach and teammates’ unwavering belief in him.
“It helps as well, just knowing that (Finch) trusts you to be able to make those certain plays,” McDaniels says. “If you do make mistakes, he’s gonna be on you. But just knowing that he would like you to do the same thing again. D’Angelo is always telling me, like, ‘You’re not gonna know if you can do things unless you just go out there and try it.’ ”
Among those things is an early offense connection with Russell. Over the past few months, the two have made a habit of teaming up a few times each night to connect on lobs in the dawn of a possession.
Minnesota often initiates plays with a dribble handoff, so opponents will situate themselves between McDaniels and Russell to prepare for that action. In response, McDaniels beelines for the rim and his floor general feeds him.
“It’s not even a play call,” he says. “It’s just a little look he’ll give me and then, it’s time. That’s when I know when to go.”
“One game, I just back cut and he was, like, ‘Yeah, that’s gonna be there every game. You should at least get that once a game,’” McDaniels says. “Every game, I at least get it, get a layup or pass out to a three.”
Through three months, the Timberwolves fielded a top-10 defense. While they’ve slipped to 13th on the season, that’s still a marked improvement from their 28th-place finish a season ago and a component of why they’re within shouting distance of hosting a playoff series.
Finch’s decision to primarily trap ball-screens, which caters more to Towns’ strengths and the arrival of Patrick Beverley, have helped key this resurgence. Jarred Vanderbilt’s presence as a true Swiss Army Knife is crucial — he has a legit All-Defensive case.
At just 21, McDaniels looks like All-Defensive teams will be a recurring honor throughout his career. He guards a spectrum of ball-handlers. He’s exceptionally fluid as a lateral mover, navigates screens efficiently and anticipates driving angles to cut off attacks. His body control means he can absorb contact and stay tethered to assignments.
At the point of attack, his length and frame pose problems. He’s also adept at closeouts, which can be arduous to master, and quickly acknowledges it’s a skill he gleaned from Minnesota’s development staff.
“Last year, they taught me, just be the second jumper-type of thing. Go out and as you run to a closeout, look like you’re gonna leap,” he says. “But for me, being as tall and as long as my arms are, I feel like I don’t have to go as close either. So, I’m a good second jumper, I can still get a good contest on it.”
Perhaps intertwined to some magnitude with schematic shifts is an evolving defensive culture, he says. Players are willing to embrace defense and have bought into “trusting each other’s abilities.” Beverley, a three-time All-Defensive honoree, radiates a level of energy that ripples throughout the roster and harps on the details to maximize execution.
Meanwhile, Russell has embraced the role of defensive communicator to provide positive value in spite of physical limitations. His lack of lateral mobility, strength, and general quickness hinder him, but his feel is astute, so he outsources certain responsibilities.
“He’s like our quarterback. We always tell him, like, ‘Alright, you’re gonna be quarterbacking tonight,’ ” McDaniels says. “Like, he’s always talking, making sure we know where to go before things even happen.”
Hammering home the allure of McDaniels’ defensive toolkit is his off-ball prowess. Not only can he disrupt guys on the ball, he’ll comfortably translate his game to a starkly different role. He’s a highly impactful help-side rim protector, equipped with both a sprightly vertical and the awareness to deploy that gift against oncoming finishers.
On shots within six feet or closer of the hoop, opponents are shooting 11.5 percent worse than average when he’s the primary defender, per NBA.com. His timing and ground coverage are irritants, unavoidable pests that are circumvented at best and overwhelming at worst for offensive players.
He says chasing off-ball shooters around pindown and flare screens is an area of emphasis for improvement. Staying out of foul trouble (4.3 per 36 minutes for his career) is also atop the to-do list. A sheepish chuckle spills out when he mentions the latter, as if growth there is so apparent that his only intermediate solution is to laugh at its painstaking necessity.
Fortunately, his context before that solution arises is far from dire. McDaniels seems in line for his first experience of playoff basketball. Duels with star scorers will be on the itinerary. He’ll benefit from them. Maybe, a couple of foul-plagued games become teachable moments guiding the roadmap ahead.
Adjusting to playoff defenses and the way they guard him alongside such potent scorers and ball-handlers should also be informative. A learning curve is sure to confront him. How he scales that is relevant for himself and the Timberwolves, each of whom are enjoying the present and seem primed to build upon it into the future.