Last season, Anthony Edwards registered his lowest three-point shooting percentage since his rookie year. Although he did most things right and was able to lead the Minnesota Timberwolves to the Conference Finals after two decades, he shot only 35.7% from beyond the arc. This season, it’s a different story.
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While talking to Trevor Ariza on an episode of All The Smoke Unplugged, Matt Barnes discussed Ant’s improved shooting skills. The two former NBA stars acknowledged that the work he has put in this summer is showing results. As per Barnes, if Edwards continues to go at this pace, he will eclipse the milestone of 300 made threes in a season.
Barnes said, “I don’t know if he’ll stay this hot but I don’t see him cooling off too much. He has a chance to eclipse 300.” In 10 games, Ant had made 54 threes in this season. At this pace, he might be able to close in on Stephen Curry’s record of 402 threes in a season as well.
Barnes and Ariza also discussed how defenders are constantly going under, which has further fueled Edwards’ rampage of threes. But that wasn’t entirely why the Minnesota star has seen better numbers, it’s also a lot of work.
Ariza said that being on the Olympics roster has helped Ant learn from his peers. He sees the T-Wolves star as a “student of the game” who used that experience to his advantage.
It seems Damian Lillard’s technique works best for Edwards and he’s been trying to copy that.
“I tried (Durant’s) way, and it didn’t work. I tried (Curry’s) way, it didn’t work,” Ant said. “And I watched (Lillard), and I start doing Dame’s shot, and it’s been working for me. I think watching Dame helped me a lot on being able to catch and shoot.”
With him being on track to perfecting the three-point shot, we could see some fireworks this season.
Anthony Edwards has worked on his three-point shooting
Last season, Ant shot 35.7% from the three-point line. It must’ve been a wake-up call for arguably one of the biggest superstars of his generation. He didn’t get a proper offseason like a majority of players in the league because he was on national duty for the Paris Olympics.
He worked on his footwork, and his catch-and-shoot skills and tried to soak in as much as he could. Now, the results are in front of everyone to see. The Wolves star is shooting 45.8% from the three-point line this season. To his advantage, teams have been making the mistake of constantly clogging the paint expecting a drive, which opens up more shooting space.
In the game against the Blazers, defenders were constantly going under screens as well. This worked in Ant’s favor as he was getting ample time to shoot the ball. After the game, he said, “I’m gonna keep shooting this b**ch” if they continue to go under.
