This season's Timberwolves embraced unpredictability at every turn

Jaden McDaniels was assessed his second foul with 44 seconds left in the first quarter last Sunday at Target Center.

This was an important tilt, for the winner between McDaniels' Timberwolves and New Orleans would receive two chances to advance through the play-in tournament and into the actual playoffs.

Brandon Ingram was cooking for the Pelicans, and the Wolves' best chance to slow him down was with McDaniels, a defensive standout.

Now, with two early fouls, McDaniels was subbed out of the game. He headed past the bench and toward the nearby players' tunnel to have a private moment of frustration.

An architectural survey of the tunnel was taken several hours before the Timberwolves-Oklahoma City tipoff on Friday night and this can be reported:

McDaniels' error was not so much in punching the material that creates this tunnel, but his timing in doing so.

When exiting into the tunnel, the first 7 feet or so has only a blue tarp-like covering. That means, as McDaniels moved with what appeared to be sulking shuffle, he had as many as three steps to unleash the punch and come away with a harmless result.

And that's how coach Chris Finch wound up having neither his best all-around defender, McDaniels, nor the oft-dynamic Naz Reid (broken wrist), to oppose the Thunder — a team with young talent now, and much more arriving with a stockpile of draft choices.

The home team was a 5½-point favorite, which seemed a touch robust for this matchup. As it turned out, it was not close to enough for Thunder backers. The Wolves used their twin 7-footers, Rudy Gobert and Karl-Anthony Towns, to overpower OKC as the game progressed and rolled to a 120-95 victory.

The Wolves got this done in front of a roaring sellout program with what was an eight-player rotation until the game was locked up. That figures to be quite the problem on Sunday when the best-of-seven series starts with Nikola Jokic and No. 1 seed Denver.

The large majority of any team's followers are win-loss based. The abundance of playoff entries in all pro sports — now including baseball — have created fan bases putting much focus on what occurs in the postseason.

If you're more interested in the adventure, in total unpredictability, the 2022-23 Timberwolves are the team for you.

For decades, the NBA has been played with more form than the other three major men's team sports — even more so than baseball, the lone competition without a salary cap.

The NBA had a handful of tankers over the final weeks of the schedule, but the top teams weren't overwhelming and the competition in the middle was outstanding.

The great local man, Terry Kunze, was saying a couple of years ago: "There are only good players in the NBA. What they need is playing time."

Injuries and "load management" gave those players more of a chance to show their talent than before.

The Wolves played 52 games without their advertised best player, Towns, and what occurred was Reid turned himself into a 6-9 standout who will get a large contract as a free agent.

Prince went 8-for-8 on threes when the Wolves went into Madison Square Garden and beat the Knicks 140-134 on March 20.

The Wolves had lost five of six before that, Tom Thibodeau's Knicks were on a winning streak that included a win at Denver and, just like that, Taurean became a triggerman in an impressive upset.

OK, this will never be the NHL, where the teams are playing to three or four goals, and with random bounces providing upsets. Let's face it: The Boston Bruins won a record 65 games and there's a 25% chance they will lose to Florida in the first round, but the uncertainty in this season's NBA has been spectacular.

Congratulations, Wolves, for joining in the fun as thoroughly as any team. We never knew what you were going to give us.