Kevin Garnett came back to Target Center on Sunday night, walking onto the floor just before tip-off and taking his seat courtside for the Minnesota Timberwolves’ 2025-26 regular season finale against the New Orleans Pelicans. It was his first visit to the building since 2018, and the crowd got the kind of homecoming only he could pull off.
Marc Lore and Alex Rodriguez escorted Garnett to his seats after he stepped onto the floor, and he was there with his two daughters as the arena played a tribute video and he acknowledged the crowd. He also dapped up Anthony Edwards before the game, a small but telling scene in a building that has been waiting for this reunion since the team said on April 3 that he would return.
The night was built around Garnett. The Timberwolves packed in-game moments, giveaways, halftime entertainment from Montell Jordan and appearances by several of his former teammates into a celebration that felt part reunion, part reset. Garnett was named a team ambassador under the club’s new owners, and his return carried extra weight because it marked a visible step in the team’s effort to repair a relationship that had been tarnished during the Glen Taylor era.
That history is hard to separate from the player Garnett became in Minnesota. He was drafted fifth overall by the Timberwolves in the 1995 NBA Draft, spent 14 seasons with the franchise and won the 2004 NBA MVP award, becoming the face of the team’s earliest rise. Chris Finch said his own introduction to that history came quickly when a shirt that read “Finch 21” was pulled away on his first day on the job in 2021. “There’s only one player who’s ever going to wear 21 here, so they didn’t think that would be a good look,” Finch said, adding that he learned right then where he stood relative to Garnett.
The timing mattered, too. Minnesota had already clinched the No. 6 seed in the Western Conference playoffs, so the result against New Orleans carried no standings impact, and the Wolves are now sitting eight players, including Anthony Edwards, Julius Randle, Naz Reid, Jaden McDaniels, Ayo Dosunmu, Mike Conley Jr., Rudy Gobert and Bones Hyland. They will open the postseason on the road April 18 and could face either the Denver Nuggets or the L.A. Lakers in the first round.
Garnett is still not being rushed into the long finish line his return points toward. The Timberwolves said he will be honored during the 2026-27 NBA season, when his No. 21 jersey will hang in the rafters, though the team has not announced details for that ceremony yet. For now, Sunday was the sound of a building welcoming back the player who once defined it — and the clearest sign yet that Minnesota wants him visible again before it tries to raise his number into the ceiling.
