
The Minnesota Timberwolves Were Nearly Named This In 1987
The Minneapolis Lakers played in Minnesota from 1947 until 1960, when they left to become the Los Angeles Lakers. It would be 29 years before another NBA team would take the floor as a home team in Minnesota.
In anticipation of the NBA granting Minnesota an expansion team, the franchise held a 'name the team' contest which spawned over 6,000 entries and just under 1,300 unique names before being narrowed down to two: 'Polars' and 'Timberwolves.'
To decide which name to go with, the team sent the question to 842 city councils throughout Minnesota. They decided by a fairly overwhelming margin to go with "Timberwolves," and the rest is history.
The team name announcement took place on January 23rd, 1987.
Now, about that history. It's admittedly... not great.
The Wolves have had just eleven winning seasons since 1989 and only four since 2005. The team has won just four playoff series in franchise history, with two coming in the 2003-04 season when the Wolves defeated the Nuggets and Kings before bowing out to the Lakers in the Western Conference Finals and the other two last season's series wins over the Nuggets and Suns.
However, the Wolves may be on an upswing. The team has made the playoffs for three straight seasons, winning a play-in round game against the Clippers at Target Center before ultimately falling to the Memphis Grizzlies in the opening round of the traditional NBA playoffs in 2022, losing to the Nuggets in the first round in 2023 but then making a run to the Western Conference Finals last year.
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