Preseason basketball answers one real question: who deserves minutes when it counts. By that measure, Minnesota's 123-112 loss to Indiana at Hilton Coliseum told you almost nothing worth remembering, except for the one guy who answered his question emphatically: Cody Williams.
Anthony Edwards did what stars do in exhibition games, going off for a strong first half before the real business of the evening got handed to the back of the roster. Tyrese Haliburton made his return to Indiana's lineup and didn't need much volume to remind everyone he was missed, finishing with a modest point total that undersold how good it was just to see him out there again. None of that decided anything, and none of it should.
What should stick with Minnesota fans is Cody Williams looking like a player with real NBA upside for the first time in a Timberwolves uniform. That matters. This is a young forward who needed a performance like this to justify the roster spot, and he delivered one in front of people who were watching specifically to see if he could. Jonathan Kuminga had a quiet debut of his own, eight points in his first look with the Timberwolves, the kind of line that raises about as many questions as it answers about what he actually adds to this roster beyond name recognition.
A preseason loss built on shaky bench defense and inconsistent shooting from the reserves is worth worrying about, if it turns into a pattern. Depth was supposed to be the separator for a team with real aspirations this season, and if the group behind the starters can't guard anybody or make shots, that's a problem that doesn't go away just because the calendar still says October.
One preseason game against a team playing its own returning star back into shape is just a data point, noisy, played at a neutral site in front of a crowd that came mostly to see Haliburton. Teams don't build playoff rotations off exhibition losses, and anyone treating this scoreline as a referendum on Minnesota's season is reaching for a conclusion the game can't support.
Minnesota now has a legitimate reason to keep giving Cody Williams real minutes instead of burying him on the bench out of habit. That's what Minnesota got out of Iowa, and it's worth more than a preseason win over Indiana ever would have been. Let the kid play. He earned it, and the Timberwolves would be wasting the one real thing this game gave them if they don't notice.
