Update: Saturday game postponed to Sunday afternoon. (Was Preview: Wounded Warriors take on Minnesota Timberwolves in Saturday road game)

Who will step up for the Dubs against a team that's had Golden State's number as of late?

Update

Update: [[ The National Basketball Association game scheduled for today between the Golden State Warriors and Minnesota Timberwolves at Target Center has been postponed. The decision was made to prioritize the safety and security of the Minneapolis

community. The game has been rescheduled for tomorrow (Jan. 25) at 5:30 p.m. ET at Target Center. ]]

I’ll be surprised if things are calm by tomorrow, but we’ll see.

Original Version

Given the way the Warriors have looked following Jimmy Butler III’s tragic landing Monday night, things are admittedly pretty bleak for Dub Nation right now. But as the schedule gods are wont to do, they have provided the Dubs with a golden opportunity right in the midst of their darkest moment.

If you’re inclined to ignore the bigger picture, to just focus on stacking wins and loses, improving playoff seeding and reaching reasonable goals for this season, then the upcoming ‘baseball series’ against the Minnesota Timberwolves is exactly the kind of scheduling quirk you might appreciate. Starting with Saturday and continuing Monday, Golden State takes on the T-Wolves in Minneapolis twice in a row, with a chance to make up ground on the team directly ahead of them in the standings. Minnesota is currently the 7th seed by 2.5 games.

It’s also an opportunity for revenge. The T-Wolves have already beaten the Warriors once this season, and no one needs to be reminded about the way last season ended…

Which is why this game is a part of the NBA’s Rivals Week. On a national broadcast (and at an unique matinee start time) Golden State has a chance to right previous losses and prove to the country that they are still relevant.

GAME DETAILS

WHO: Golden State Warriors (25-21) at Minnesota Timberwolves (27-18)

WHEN: Saturday, January 24th, 2026; 2:30 pm PST

WATCH: ABC

Compared to some of the other pairs of teams the league has selected as rivals, the Warriors vs Timberwolves has the requisite recent history and competitive relevance. Unfortunately for the Dubs, that history is pretty slanted and not in their favor.

Since the start of the 2022 Season and including the playoff series last year, Minnesota has won 11 of the last 16 matchups, and many of those losses have come in debilitating or contentious fashion. Whether its Draymond choking long time Warriors adversary Rudy Gobert, Anthony Edwards reminding them how close they were to drafting another franchise cornerstone in 2020 or Warriors’ Killer Naz Reid dunking and firebombing away from deep, when these two teams are engaged on the court the outcome has been mostly unkind to Golden State, and often disastrous.

So it would be preferable to face a matchup as talented and specifically formidable to the Warriors as the T-Wolves under better circumstances, but there is a silver lining at the moment. Minnesota is on a four game losing streak, its longest of the season, and tied with the lowly Sacramento Kangz for the longest active streak of impotency in the Western Conference.

One streak is going to come to an end tonight, and it could be the Warriors’ 5 consecutive losses to the T-Wolves and their current 3 game slide. It could also be Minnesota’s own recent struggles that are going to come to an end. And if it’s going to be a good night for the Dubs, Steph Curry is going to need a lot of help.

After a 38 point, eight 3’s masterpiece in a loss against Dallas, Steph’s exploits are starting to draw comparisons to Mike Trout, Shohei Ohtani and famed fictional baseball player Tungsten Arm’ O’Doyle, as framed by one of the greatest tweets of all time:

(Side note: The basketball equivalent to old ‘Tungsten Arm’ — a historical player with legendary personal statistical achievements unmatched for decades — is probably former Warrior Wilt Chamberlain, whose anachronistic exploits, while real, certainly sound fake.)

Without Jimmy Butler’s incredible impact on winning and ability to lift the role players that surround him, Steph is going to have to reach even loftier heights for the team to have a chance, and a lot of the time it’s probably still not going to be enough to overcome the lack of talent.

For example, De’Anthony Melton, Moses Moody and Jonathan Kuminga were the only players besides Curry who reached double figures on Thursday. And they’ll once again take the floor without Kuminga on Saturday.

Apart from struggling to secure regular playing time, the other unfortunate refrain of Kuminga’s career has been injuries. It feels like every single time he’s had a breakthrough, a cruel twist of injury fate robs him of a chance to build on any momentum and deepen his game. An ankle sprain and knee injury sustained against Dallas is the latest example, and like all the previous ailments, it couldn’t have come at a worse time. Particularly given his success against Minnesota in last year’s playoffs.

One other situation to monitor: Quinten Post was benched after his first five minute run on Thursday night, and a lack of size plagued the Warriors the rest of the way. They were out rebounded by the Mavericks 83.6 to 66 percent, and the disparity was worse on the offensive glass: 16% OREB% for the Warriors versus 34% for Dallas. It will be interesting to see if Post remains a starter and if he’s reinstated to his regular place in the rotation, especially given the Timberwolves size (Gobert, Reid, Randle, McDaniels and French rookie center Joan Beringer) and athleticism (Edwards, DiVincenzo).

Prediction

While it would be incredibly satisfying for the Warriors to figure some things out right now and show up on a big stage against a frequently victorious foe, I think the far most likely outcome is that they’re once again done in by the towering front line of the Timberwolves combined with their athletic burst and elite shooting. There are only a handful of teams in the league that pose an even worse threat to Golden State than Minnesota, and with the Warriors two biggest antidotes injured in this matchup, it will probably be more of the same.