The Timberwolves entered the NBA as an expansion franchise in 1989, one of four teams added that era, and gave the state of Minnesota its first NBA team since the Lakers left for Los Angeles decades earlier. The club spent its first several seasons near the bottom of the standings before the 1995 arrival of Kevin Garnett, drafted out of high school, turned the franchise into a consistent playoff participant; around him the team built competitive rosters that captured a division title in 2004 and reached the Western Conference finals that same year behind an MVP season from Garnett, though a title never followed and the roster was broken up soon after.

The years following Garnett's 2007 trade to Boston were marked by rebuilding through the draft, with high picks spent on players such as Kevin Love, Ricky Rubio, Andrew Wiggins, and Karl-Anthony Towns, though sustained playoff success remained elusive for most of the 2010s. A later infusion of talent, including the drafting of Anthony Edwards and a trade for Rudy Gobert, returned the franchise to relevance, and Minnesota advanced to back-to-back Western Conference finals in 2024 and 2025. Ownership of the team changed hands as well during this period, passing from longtime owner Glen Taylor to a group led by Marc Lore and Alex Rodriguez, and then, in 2026, transitioning again to a group led by Marc Stad.