Timberwolves Vs Nuggets: Hyland, bench carry Minnesota to 117-108 win at Ball Arena
The timberwolves vs nuggets matchup ended with Minnesota walking out of Ball Arena with a 117-108 victory on Sunday, March 1, 2026, a result that instantly reshaped a March that the preview called the month where the standings start to feel like a knife fight.
Timberwolves Vs Nuggets at Ball Arena
The game in Denver — scheduled for 2: 30 p. m. CST (3: 30 p. m. ET) in the pregame notice — finished 117-108 in favor of the Timberwolves at Ball Arena. Bones Hyland, a former Nugget, led a strong Wolves bench with 18 points, 2 rebounds and 2 assists on 6-of-7 shooting in 15 minutes. Jonas Valanciunas entered only to spell Nikola Jokic for 9 minutes, and Denver lost those minutes by 15.
Bones Hyland sparks Wolves bench
Hyland’s performance was the clearest bench spark: Denver originally drafted him 26th overall in 2021, he made an All-Rookie team, was traded away the next season, saw his play decline and was almost out of the league last offseason. The Wolves signed him, and he has carved out a rotation spot — showing that clearly with his 18-point relief outing against his old team on Sunday afternoon.
Nuggets' bench minutes and injury slide
Denver’s problems outside of Jokic again showed up: the defense wasn’t great, late-game offense wasn’t great, Cam Johnson didn’t play well, and the non-Jokic minutes were a disaster. The team has staggered Cam’s minutes before his injury, relying on him to carry the second unit, but that approach hasn’t worked recently. Missing Aaron Gordon and Peyton Watson makes depth issues worse; Gordon has been sidelined with a hamstring and might be back Sunday but would almost certainly not be at peak Gordon. Since Nikola Jokic returned from his knee injury, the Nuggets are 5-8 and have fallen to fifth place in the West, tied in the loss column with the Lakers for sixth.
Minnesota’s defensive flashes and what’s next
The Timberwolves arrived in Denver having survived the first two stops of their road trip against the Blazers and Clippers — both wins described as more stressful than they had any right to be, but wins nonetheless — and they banked those victories before facing the Nuggets. Preview notes emphasized that Minnesota beat Denver in the 2024 playoff series by playing connected defense with five players moving like a single organism; that version of the Wolves has appeared only in brief flashes this season, most notably in their last game against Oklahoma City when they swarmed the champs.
The pregame copy warned that “in flashes” doesn’t work against Denver: if defenders help lazily, Jokic finds the open guy; if you ball-watch, Jamal Murray can get free; late rotations yield layups and corner threes. The preview even said Wolves guards need to put Jamal Murray in a straight jacket. Earlier in the season, Denver had taken all three meetings, with the most recent victory coming on Christmas Day when the Nuggets built a commanding lead, the Wolves rallied and Ant hit a clutch shot to force overtime before Denver still walked away with the win.
With March kicking off and both clubs facing “20-something games left, ” the result in Denver will matter in the standings and in how each team approaches the stretch run. The game had been slated for national television on ABC and radio coverage on Wolves App and iHeart Radio; the teams now turn to the dense March schedule with that head-to-head result logged and the Nuggets left to address their non-Jokic minute woes and rotation availability.
