Minnesota Timberwolves fans can quickly see a fresh rookie play.
The 2025-26 regular season is still far away, but fans will be seeing rookies for the first time in the NBA Summer League.
The Minnesota Timberwolves will be one of 30 NBA teams to participate in the competition held in Las Vegas.
Speaking of rosters, Rocco Zikarsky’s 45th overall pick, the 2025 NBA draft, will make his debut with The Timberwolves.
The Timberwolves will begin their summer 2025 league journey in a matchup with the Pelicans in New Orleans.
Zikarsky will probably buy a good time under assistant coach Kevin Hanson. Prior to the expected match, the 18-year-old received immense praise from another T-Wolf coach, Max Lefeb.
“First impression, he’s huge,” Lefeb told the media. “It’s a big person. A super nice kid, a sense of humor, who he is, what he needs to work on, the path ahead, he’s very good to be around.”
Well, that’s a great praise for Zikarsky. He shares the court with No. 17 in the draft of Joan Bellinger, who blew Timberwolves President Tim Connery.
In many cases, the second round picks failed to carve out a successful career in the NBA. Of course, there are exceptions to this, such as Denver Nuggets superstar Nikola Jokic.
Coming to Zikarsky, the outstanding quality of the Timberwolves rookie is his 7’2” physique. Being a center, he was able to potentially find himself in the regular season on the Chris Finch roster.
As for his previous experience, Zikarsky did not play in the NCAA, but played two seasons for the Brisbane Bullets in the NBL.
| statistics | 2023-24 | 2024-25 |
| point | 3.2 ppg | 4.6 ppg |
| rebound | 2.1 RPG | 3.4 RPG |
| assist | 0.1 APG | 0.3 APG |
During the NBL, he averaged 3.8 points, 3.4 rebounds and 0.3 assists per game for the team. The numbers may not come out of the box, but don’t forget that he is a second round pick.
It will be interesting to see if Zikarsky also works with his three-point shot, as Zikarsky attempted just six shots from Deep during the NBL.