In the three-year history of the Emirates NBA Cup, 17 teams have advanced to the knockout stage at least once. The LA Clippers and the Minnesota Timberwolves are two of the exceptions.
The Clippers and Timberwolves are both in West Group B, which also features the Oklahoma City Thunder, the New Orleans Pelicans, and the Memphis Grizzlies. They’ll begin their Group B play tonight at 8 p.m. ET with a matchup in Minnesota.
LA’s injury report is pretty long, as Bradley Beal (knee), Brandon Ingram (heel), Jordan Miller (shoulder), Yanic Konan Niederhäuser (foot), and Max Strus (foot) have all yet to make their season debuts, and Rui Hachimura (quad) is questionable after missing Wednesday night’s game against the Los Angeles Lakers. The Timberwolves have just two names on their injury report, but they’re both starters, as Donte DiVincenzo tore his Achilles tendon in the first round of the playoffs and Anthony Edwards underwent knee surgery.
Even without Edwards, the Timberwolves are 7.5-point favorites on DraftKings Sportsbook (-265 Moneyline), with the point total set to 223.5. The Clippers are +215 on the Moneyline.
Below, I’ll break down tonight’s NBA Cup showdown and offer a prediction.
LA Clippers at Minnesota Timberwolves preview, prediction
LA had a tumultuous offseason for reasons both related and unrelated to basketball, but this season represents the start of a new Clippers era. Kawhi Leonard is now gone, back on the Toronto Raptors, and Darius Garland and Keaton Wagler are the back-court of the future. Garland has averaged 21.5 points per game so far, Wagler 15.0, and backup center Brook Lopez 14.0, his most since 2022/23. The Clippers have struggled to score, ranking 28th in offensive rating, but they’ve had the seventh-best defense. The latter might not be sustainable, but Tyronn Lue managed to coach LA to the eighth-best defense even in 2021/22, when Leonard missed the entire season with a torn ACL.
Minnesota also made a couple of major changes during the offseason, trading Naz Reid for LaMelo Ball and salary-dumping Julius Randle to the Brooklyn Nets in a corresponding move. Ball has had a quiet offensive season so far, averaging just 13.4 points per game, but fellow offseason acquisition Jonathan Kuminga has been solid and Jaden McDaniels has continued his offensive leap. The Timberwolves got off to a 3-0 start before dropping each of their last two games. They currently rank seventh on offense and 13th on defense, and they were actually slightly better without Edwards on the floor in both 2024/25 and 2025/26.
Clippers at Timberwolves pick, best bet
Minnesota’s advantage on the interior would be more significant with Edwards, given that he’s a relentless driver, but the Timberwolves still got to the restricted area one more time than the Clippers did in each team’s most recent game despite being without Edwards. Both in 2025/26 and so far in 2026/27, Minnesota has been better at getting to the basket and slightly worse at finishing, but I expect its accuracy to climb when Rudy Gobert (42.1% inside the restricted area so far this season despite leading the league in field goal percentage last season) snaps out of his funk. I trust the Timberwolves’ rim protection more as well; Gobert is a four-time Defensive Player of the Year and Isaiah Jackson is not.
Minnesota also ranked 11th in total rebounding percentage last season and LA 23rd, and while the Clippers have improved their glass presence so far this season, so have the Timberwolves now that Joan Beringer (an even more dominant rebounder than Gobert on a per-100 basis) has earned a spot in the rotation. Minnesota also snagged boards at a rate 2.9 percentage points higher with Edwards off the floor last season. LA has been better offensively in transition, but it has had major turnover issues in the early going, so the Timberwolves could take advantage of that. Much like last season, the Clippers have been more disciplined, but Minnesota has been better at getting to the charity stripe.
The Timberwolves were much better at producing high-quality looks in 2025/26 than LA was, and it has been slightly better so far in 2026/27 as well. Both teams have connected on more than two-fifths of their wide-open threes so far, though both have some players likely to heat up (Hachimura likely won’t continue shooting 31.6% from deep, just as McDaniels should climb from his 31.8%) and others likely to cool down (Derrick Jones Jr. won’t keep shooting 55.6% and Kuminga will decline from 47.6%). Last season, Minnesota gave up just four more uncontested looks than the Clippers throughout the course of the season, although LA has been far better at closing out on opposing shooters so far in 2026/27.
Although the Timberwolves lost their first game without Edwards, giving up 44 points to Stephen Curry and committing 29 fouls in a 119-114 loss to the Golden State Warriors, they still went a solid 12-9 in the 21 games he missed in 2025/26. LA opened its season with a dominant win and had been fairly competitive in two of its three losses, but its lone win came against the Sacramento Kings, the West’s only winless team so far. I expect Minnesota to win comfortably and to hold the Clippers to under 107.5 points.
