The Minnesota Timberwolves are moving onto the Western Conference Semifinals after sweeping the Phoenix Suns, and on Monday night, we learned that they will end up facing the defending champion Denver Nuggets. The Wolves will enter the series relatively healthy, although there’s one unusual exception to this: head coach Chris Finch, who left the waning moments of Game 4 against Phoenix after a freak collision with Mike Conley.
Finch held his knee and found himself in some serious pain, and on Tuesday, we learned that he needs to undergo surgery to repair a ruptured patellar tendon. As a result, Ramona Shelburne and Adrian Wojnarowski of ESPN report that it’s possible Finch won’t be able to join the team on the bench for the start of the Nuggets series.
In the early stages of his rehabilitation, Finch will be required to keep right leg immobilized in a brace. If Finch isn’t able to park on the sidelines to start the series, assistant Micah Nori will coach Game 1 on Saturday, with Finch likely communicating to the bench from the locker room, sources said.
Nori has been a trusted Finch assistant for years, and took over on the bench after he left the game against Phoenix. There’s no word on how Finch communicating from the locker room would work — whether it’d be via a headset or someone running back and forth between the bench and the locker room — but ESPN did report that he should get the all clear to travel to Denver for Game 1.