The Minnesota Timberwolves eliminated the Denver Nuggets from the first round of the NBA playoffs on Thursday, winning 110-98 to close out the series. For most players on the roster, it was a satisfying series win. For Bones Hyland, it was something with a longer backstory.
The day after the final buzzer, He posted the same message to both X and Instagram.
Pointed. Specific. Three years in the making.
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What Hyland actually did in the series
Before the social media angle runs away with the story, the numbers are worth noting. Hyland appeared in all six games of the series, averaging 7.2 points per game on 41.2% shooting in just under 14 minutes per contest. He was not a starter. He was not asked to carry games. But he contributed, and his best moment came when the series was still in the balance.
In Game 2, a 119-114 Timberwolves win, Hyland scored 13 points off the bench and connected on three of four attempts from beyond the arc. Minnesota took that game and ultimately the series, and Hyland was part of why.
For context on how far he had come, Hyland played a total of 17 minutes for the Timberwolves across all of last season after arriving at the trade deadline. His role expanded significantly this year, particularly from December onward, when he shot 39.4% from three and averaged 9.7 points per game for the club.
Why Denver traded him in the first place
Hyland was selected by Denver with the 26th pick in the 2021 draft under then-general manager Tim Connelly, who now runs Minnesota’s front office. That connection between the two franchises runs deeper than Hyland alone, and it has given this Western Conference rivalry a specific texture over the past few seasons.
The trade itself happened ahead of the 2023 deadline, when the Nuggets, by then operating under new general manager Calvin Booth, sent Hyland to the Los Angeles Clippers in exchange for two second-round picks. It was a modest return for a second-year player who had shown genuine upside as a bench scorer.
Booth addressed the reasoning in a 2023 interview with The Ringer. His explanation centered on roster fit and the decision to prioritize Christian Braun, Denver’s 2022 first-round pick, for His minutes and salary. Booth was direct about the evaluation, describing the situation in terms of defensive limitations and the difficulty of carrying multiple young players with overlapping profiles.
Hyland missed Denver’s championship run that June by a matter of months. The Nuggets won the title. He watched from elsewhere.
The full arc
What makes the moment land is the specific shape of the path. Hyland went from Denver to the Clippers to a buyout to Minnesota, where he spent most of his first season barely getting on the floor. He re-signed anyway. He found his role in December. He made the playoff rotation.
And then Denver showed up in the first round.
The Timberwolves won the series in six games, exactly as Hyland predicted in his post. Whether that reads as genuine belief or convenient hindsight probably depends on which team you follow. Either way, the sequence, traded, replaced, sidelined, then back on the floor against the same franchise in a winner-take-all context, does not happen often enough to dismiss as coincidence.
Hyland has said everything he needs to say. The scoreboard filled in the rest.
