PHOENIX — There's a fiery nature inside Timberwolves coach Chris Finch that he can often suppress when he speaks to the media before and after games. Players say it can come out in practices, but in public, Finch usually doles out praise and criticism of his team in the same even-keeled, mild manner.

But that fire came out a bit after the Wolves' Game 3 victory over the Suns on Friday night when Finch was asked how this group of players has seemingly put decades of franchise futility behind it as it approached the first playoff series victory for the Wolves since 2004.

"I don't care what happened beforehand," Finch said. "But the reality is that we have a bunch of guys who love playing together, play the right way, they're young, they let me coach them hard, and it's been fun.

"That's been the foundation of being able to grow this little by little. Long way to go for us but, yeah, we don't really care what happened before because it doesn't relate to any of us."

The Wolves, who won the first three games of the best-of-seven Western Conference quarterfinal series, will go for the sweep Sunday night at Footprint Center.

The saying goes that those who don't learn from history are doomed to repeat it. Perhaps in the case of this Wolves team, not knowing, or not caring, about the team's history might be the best thing.

Nobody is weighed down with the baggage of losing season after losing season; false hope that never materialized and lottery after lottery that didn't see the Wolves get a paradigm changing talent the way the 2020 draft did with Anthony Edwards. In his four seasons, Edwards has been to the playoffs three times. The only history he cares about is his own recent history of not making it out of the first round — and he knows the Wolves will not take the Suns lightly, even with the large lead in the series.

"We can't think that they're going to give us the game because they're down 3-0," Edwards said. "They want to win a game. They don't want to go out and get swept. We got to come out and be ready to compete at a high level, even more than we did in the first three games. We gonna be ready."

The only player who has had firsthand experience with several losing seasons in Minnesota on this team's roster is Karl-Anthony Towns, who made the playoffs once in his first six seasons and would at times appear frustrated during seasons in which the team wasn't competitive.

"What I think is great about this team is we have guys who have playoff experience and have made it past first rounds, second round, even conference finals," Towns said. "Everyone in this locker room is understanding the team that's on the other side, how great they are."

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