Timberwolves get No. 3 seed, will face Suns in first round after blowout loss

Minnesota and Phoenix will meet again soon.

Minnesota Timberwolves forward Karl-Anthony Towns (32) works against the defense of Phoenix Suns forward Kevin Durant (35) in the first quarter at Target Center in Minneapolis on April 14, 2024. / Bruce Kluckhohn / USA TODAY Sports

The good news is the Timberwolves already know who they’ll be playing in their first-round playoff series. The bad news is they didn’t play too well against that team on Sunday.

The Wolves were blown out 125-106 by the Phoenix Suns at Target Center in Minneapolis Sunday afternoon while the Oklahoma City Thunder and Denver Nuggets each on their regular-season finales, leaving the Wolves with the third seed in the Western Conference.

The Los Angeles Lakers, meanwhile, beat the New Orleans Pelicans Sunday, locking the Suns into the sixth seed in the conference. That leaves the Wolves facing the Suns in the first round of the playoffs.

So essentially, Sunday's game was just a preview for that playoff series. And if the Timberwolves want to get out of the first round of the playoffs, they'll need to play a lot better than they did on Sunday.

The Timberwolves (56-26) recorded 19 of their 24 turnovers in the first half and dug themselves a 22-point hold in the first quarter, one they could never fully dig out of. Minnesota did cut its deficit down to 11 points by the end of the third quarter but couldn't ever get much closer.

"I think we had 19 (turnovers) at halftime, which basically set the tone. That’s a pretty unrecoverable number,” Timberwolves coach Chris Finch said.

Bradley Beal scored 16 of his game-high 36 points in the first quarter to help the Suns (49-33) control Sunday's game from start to finish. Beal even got into a jawing session with Anthony Edwards in the second quarter that resulted in technical fouls for both Beal and Edwards after both benches cleared.

"(Beal) was barking at our bench," Finch said.

Beal was hot, and he got plenty of help from Devin Booker and Grayson Allen, who finished with 23 and 20 points, respectively. Kevin Durant contributed 15 points.

Rudy Gobert scored a team-high 21 points for the Timberwolves, who saw five players overall finish in double figures. Karl-Anthony Towns hasn't looked quite like himself in just his second game back after returning from a torn meniscus, but he finished with 10 points and six rebounds and hit another big shot — a long 2 in the third quarter that cut the Wolves' deficit to 10 points.

But that was as close as the Timberwolves would get as the Suns pulled away early in the fourth quarter, setting up a rematch in the first round of the playoffs. The Wolves will have their work cut out for them against a Suns team that's handed them thrice this season.

They'll meet for Game 1 on Saturday.

“We got to move the ball a little bit better, move it away from the crowd. We got to pick up our decision-making," Finch said. "Obviously cut down our turnovers. Defensively we got to find some solutions with some matchups.”