Chris Finch walked away from Toyota Center on Friday night with a road win over a red-hot Houston team — and a detailed explanation for why he believes Minnesota is quietly building the kind of depth that can do damage in the playoffs.
Much of his press conference centered on Mike Conley, who has been one of the league’s best stories over the final stretch of the regular season after spending much of the year mired in a shooting slump. Finch offered his most candid diagnosis yet of what went wrong and what finally fixed it.
“He’s been in a season-long slump really. A lot of that was role related — inconsistency, maybe the style of play, the guys he was in there with, opportunities. He was probably not looking for his shot first and foremost, trying to give the team what it needed. And when you only get a couple of shots and you pass up one or two, you can play yourself right out of rhythm,” he said.
The turning point, Finch revealed, came during a mop-up stint in a Dallas game a couple of weeks ago. “We just said just shoot — get up as many shots as you can. I put him back in and it’s like, don’t pass, just get up shots. They didn’t go in, but then they started going in the next game. I think it always comes back around,” he said. “And his defense remains elite. He is one of the best guys I’ve ever seen chasing catch-and-shoot players, and he was outstanding again tonight.”
On how that form might translate into a playoff role, Finch was deliberately open-ended. “It could be style of play based, it could be matchup based, it could be needing a spark, it could be finding an opportunity to throw him in because he’s been playing well. It could be a lot of things — and those are great options to have,” he said.
Finch also singled out the team’s offensive structure as a bigger-picture positive from the night. “Decision-making was quick for the most part. We went somewhere with the ball. Sometimes we have a habit of just dribbling and going nowhere. We cut and moved off it. We played through Kyle Anderson — he was an incredible hub. When you can do that enough times, you’re going to go in,” he said.
Terrence Shannon Jr. led Minnesota with 23 points off the bench, while Anthony Edwards delivered the dagger — a three-pointer with just over a minute left to push the lead to seven after Houston had cut it to four. The Timberwolves, now 48-33, head home to host New Orleans on Sunday before turning their full attention to a playoff seeding picture still very much in play.
