The Timberwolves took a 69-59 halftime lead into the visiting locker room in Miami on Wednesday night. At that point, they had taken a whopping 26 three-pointers and made 12 of them (46 percent). Their onslaught from long range, led by Anthony Edwards and LaMelo Ball, was a big reason why the Wolves had the lead despite a dominant first half from Giannis Antetokounmpo.
That didn’t stop ESPN’s Charles Barkley from pulling out what’s become a common criticism of his over the years. “They shoot to many threes,” he said. “There’s a lot of times they could get a layup.”
It was essentially the first thing anyone said on the Inside The NBA halftime show, which was a little odd considering the scoreline. Somewhat ironically, the show’s producers then began playing a cut-up of Ball draining threes.
“Their shot selection — there’s 17 seconds to go on the shot clock. 16 seconds to go on the shot clock. … I’d like to see LaMelo get them to the basket. Faster pace like they’re doing, but they relying too much on threes,” said Barkley.
And Barkley wasn’t done. After some discussion of Antetokounmpo’s great half and Edwards getting to play off the ball more with the addition of Ball, Chuck was back at it.
“I just think Minnesota shoots too many threes,” he reiterated. “Because they only got four free-throw attempts. That’s almost impossible. Those threes are great when they’re going in —
“And a lot of them have, 12 for 26,” Ernie Johnson noted.
“Yeah, but when they don’t go in, you gotta get to the free-throw line, Ernie,” Barkley responded. “They only got four free throws. That’s not good.”
The Wolves proceeded to get three more threes from Edwards and Ball in the first couple minutes of the second half, stretching their lead to 17. They finished with 21 made threes on 50 attempts in a 131-106 win that was never close in the fourth quarter.
Minnesota scored 63 points from beyond the arc. Miami, with just eight threes, had 24. That’s a massive 39-point edge for the road team. The Wolves also out-rebounded the Heat (52 to 34) and finished with more free-throw attempts (29 to 26), so it wasn’t a completely one-dimensional win.
Quite simply, it’s a lazy, outdated, and dumb take from Barkley, a legend who played in a completely different era of basketball. He’s been complaining about teams shooting too many threes since Stephen Curry and the Warriors revolutionized basketball and formed a dynasty with the long-range shot.
Edwards is arguably the best three-point shooter in the NBA right now. He led the league in threes two seasons ago and has hit them at just under a 40 percent clip on very high volume for the last two years. On Wednesday, Edwards made nine of his 17 attempts from beyond the arc in a brilliant 45-point shotmaking display.
Ball is also a very prolific three-point shooter, having finished second in makes last season. He’s not always quite as efficient (he was 5 for 13 on Wednesday), but opponents have to respect his willingness to fire away from 30-plus feet. The Wolves also have guys like Jaden McDaniels, Jonathan Kuminga, Ayo Dosunmu, and Terrence Shannon Jr. who are capable of knocking down open looks from deep.
“I thought most of ’em came in a good flow,” Chris Finch said. “Or even the self-generated ones were Ant when he was on a roll, LaMelo off Rudy screens. We’ve not intentionally talked about upping our three-point volume. We’ve kind of had to do that, generally. But we figured it would be a benefit of how we could play.”
Outside of shots at the rim, quality looks from three are the most efficient shots in basketball. And on this particular night, with Antetokounmpo and Bam Adebayo patrolling the paint, it made plenty of sense for the Wolves to let shots fly from deep instead of trying to force the ball to the rim.
Will there be nights where taking 50 threes isn’t the ideal strategy? For sure. Maybe they aren’t falling, and the Wolves have to adjust as a result. Maybe a team applies more ball pressure and doesn’t have the same kind of rim protection as Miami, opening up driving and cutting lanes. But for the most part, there’s no reason why Edwards and Ball shouldn’t make the Wolves one of the NBA’s highest-volume three-point shooting teams.
On this night, the shots were there, they went in, and the result was a comfortable road win over a good team.
“To be honest, I ain’t even know we shot 50 threes,” Jaden McDaniels said. “But I mean, we got a bunch of good shooters. We always putting in our work on the threes after practice, before. … At least if it’s 40 percent, we’re good. It worked. They (Edwards and Ball) was making the shots. You can’t be mad at it. That’s what (the defense) was giving, they take it.”
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This story was originally published by Bring Me The Sports on Oct 22, 2026, where it first appeared in the MN Timberwolves section. Add Bring Me The Sports as a Preferred Source by clicking here.