Julius Randle reveals his 'Welcome to Minnesota' moment

It's been 13 months since Julius Randle found himself relocating to Minnesota after the Timberwolves and Knicks completed a blockbuster trade involving Karl-Anthony Towns.

Randle was good enough last season to earn a contract extension with Minnesota, but he says it took him the entire season to get comfortable in his new home.

"Man, this feels like night and day compared to last year," Randle said in an interview with Wolves announcer Michael Grady, adding that "it took a whole year" to get comfortable.

Feeling completely settled in, Randle is looking back and recalling his "Welcome to Minnesota" moment: His 14th game with Minnesota, when he hit a three at the buzzer to beat the Suns on Nov. 17, 2024.

"That was incredible, man. That was like a Welcome to Minnesota moment for me. I tell people all the time, the coolest part was seeing my teammates celebrate. Ant was the happiest person. Like, Ant's a superstar, you know what I mean? He was the happiest person in the locker room that I hit the shot," Randle said. "Extremely happy. Everybody just dancing, jumping around, just happy. I was like, 'Man, this team chemistry's legit.' Just seeing how the team celebrates other people's success was huge, it was incredible."

That team chemistry could be at an all-time high in 2025-26 as the Wolves brought back nearly the entire group that reached the Western Conference finals last season. The lone loss is Nickeil Alexander-Walker, who signed with Atlanta.

"The team clearly feels like we got what we need in this locker room, and we got enough to do what we need to do — to win it," Randle said.

How do they get over the hump and reach the NBA Finals?

"It starts with our mindset from Day 1. We didn't do anything crazy to where we made all of these adjustments, but what we did do is we said we got enough in this locker room," Randle said. "It's going to become vital for us to have the right mindset from Day 1. It's really about internal growth and our standard of what we know we need to do every single day to take that next step."