The Golden State Warriors survived the Houston Rockets in seven games to set up a daunting showdown with the Minnesota Timberwolves.
The pregame narrative: Minnesota handled business in the opening round, taking down Luka Doncic’s Los Angeles Lakers in five games. Golden State almost let a 3-1 lead slip away and enters this second-round matchup as a +155 underdog to advance.
Check out my Warriors vs. Timberwolves Game 1 prop picks for Tuesday, May 6, featuring plays on Minnesota’s Rudy Gobert and Julius Randle.
Warriors vs. Timberwolves prop picks
Best Bet: Gobert over 10.5 rebounds (-120)
Gobert’s first round was interesting to say the least. He turned in four duds before playing the role of hero in Game 5.
- The veteran torched the Lakers for 27 points and 24 rebounds.
- His point production was more than he’d had in the previous four games combined. He grabbed a total of 25 rebounds in Games 1-4 of that series.
- Gobert never touched the 30-minute mark in Games 1-4 before logging 39 in the closeout game.
So what can we expect from him in Game 1? It’s hard not to believe Gobert bought himself some goodwill with his series-clinching performance.
The Warriors are an interesting matchup for Gobert and the Timberwolves, as any Golden State lineup will be undersized.
Golden State’s most common five-man lineups in the opening round saw the 6-foot-6 Draymond Green at centre. So the Warriors will give up plenty of size with the 7-foot-1 Gobert on the court.
Minnesota can either go big with Gobert and achieve a likely edge on the boards or go a smaller, more athletic route to match up better with Golden State.
My best guess is the Timberwolves go somewhere in the middle, ensuring enough minutes for Gobert to have a big game on the glass.
While Gobert doesn’t have the offensive upside to secure the same minutes as Alperen Sengun, we just saw the Rockets centre torch the Warriors in the first round.
- Sengun averaged 11.9 boards in the series, hauling in 14+ three times.
- Gobert is the best rebounder in this series, averaging 10.9/game in the regular season.
Key stat: Gobert had 10-plus rebounds in three of four games vs. Golden State this season (averaging 10.5 in the head-to-head).
Game 1 prop prediction
Randle over 27.5 points/rebounds (-113): Randle is another player who can benefit from Golden State’s small-ball lineups.
He doesn’t have the same size as Gobert. But at 6-foot-9, there will likely be stretches when he’s the tallest player on the court.
Randle only averaged 5.2 boards in the Lakers series, but he was a beast offensively and has more rebounding upside than that.
- The 30-year-old averaged 7.1 RPG in the regular season.
- Randle averaged 8.3 rebounds in four games vs. Golden State this season.
- He averaged at least 9.0 RPG in five straight seasons coming into this year.
After a 16-point, five-rebound Game 1 against Los Angeles, Randle cleared this line in four straight. He averaged 38.0 minutes in the series, scoring 25-plus points twice.
Randle’s 22.6 PPG scoring average in the Lakers series was second on Minnesota to Anthony Edwards (26.8).
Warriors vs. Timberwolves prop picks made at 11:58 a.m. ET 05/06/2025.
Chris joined NorthStar Gaming from Covers.com where he was a publishing editor and wrote betting content. Before that, he was the sports editor at VICE Canada, worked for theScore and covered the Blue Jays for MLB.com. In addition to filling out the lineup card each day for the editorial team, Chris writes frequently himself, primarily on the NBA and MLB.