Why the Timberwolves are flying high: Five home games. Five wins. Five sellouts.

Timberwolves observers have been witnesses to two specific phenomena over the years, both of which are equal in their damage:

*The Wolves start to play well and build up hope leading into a marquee matchup in front of a loud home crowd, only to come up short and lose. Fans then say "same old Wolves," and their enthusiasm is dulled a little.

*The Wolves defeat a team in a marquee matchup, everyone gets excited about the possibilities, and then they lay an absolute egg in the very next game and lose to a bad team. Fans then say "same old Wolves," and their enthusiasm is dulled a little.

Those dents to the base add up like micro-aggressions, and jaded fans go into self-preservation mode where the burden of proof that something has actually changed is greater and any contrary evidence is easy to cherry-pick.

Prove it. Prove it again. Then prove it again. OK, now prove it one more time. Is it really different?

And, well, it feels like it is right now? That was my view on Thursday's Daily Delivery podcast, after watching what seems like the best Timberwolves homestand in recent memory.

The Wolves started the homestand 1-2, having coughed up a 21-point lead at Atlanta. But then they flattened previously undefeated Denver in front of a raucous sellout crowd. That was followed by zero letdown in what has often been a letdown scenario, a blowout win over Utah. Then the gritty overtime win over another previously undefeated team, Boston. And Wednesday, again nowhere near a letdown in a drubbing of shorthanded New Orleans.

Combined with the home opener against Miami, there's this: Five home games. Five Wolves wins. Five sellout crowds.

The opening home win streak and sellout streak haven't been eclipsed since the 1990s, long before the scar tissue formed around the wounds of the fan base.

Bill Simmons watched the Wolves beat his beloved Celtics and on his latest podcast called Minnesota the fifth-best team in the NBA.

Just as notable, perhaps: Per the Wolves' numbers, TV ratings this year on Bally Sports North (entering the Pelicans game) are up 65% over last year. I've written plenty about the problems with BSN and fan frustration, but clearly a lot of Wolves fans have been finding the games on TV so far. Corporate partnerships are also up significantly, the Wolves say.

There is no "mission accomplished" here after seven games, nor is there an absolute declaration that the Wolves have turned some sort of corner. Proclamations like that have often been followed by the Wolves stepping on a metaphorical rake and slinking back into the shadows.

We'll learn a lot over the next 75 games, including the next five on the road. But those first five at home? You can't do any better than that.

Here are four more things to know today:

*The main segment of Thursday's show was spent with Chip Scoggins talking about his excellent story on Laurence Maroney and Marion Barber III.

*I wrote last week about the Wild's myriad problems, asserting that defense and goaltending were both to blame for all the pucks flying into Minnesota nets. Wild GM Bill Guerin is making a bet that defense is the larger culprit, as evidenced by his two trades Wednesday and his words after the fact.

"We've been giving up way too many chances," Guerin said. "We need to shift our way of thinking a bit and protect our goaltenders. We have good goaltending, but goaltending doesn't matter if you just hang them out to dry."

*Shohei Ohtani is going to make a lot of money this offseason. He's also planning to donate 60,000 baseball gloves to kids in Japan.

*Friday's podcast guest is Gophers football writer Randy Johnson. It is possible to simultaneously talk about the Gophers (still) winning the Big Ten West while also wondering if they will fall short of bowl eligibility.