Julius Randle will stay in Minnesota with three-year, $100 million contract

Julius Randle was set to decide whether to opt in or opt out of a $31 million player option on Sunday.

On Saturday, the Wolves and Randle were working hard to get a deal done before the deadline hit.

Mission accomplished.

Randle will opt out of his contract and sign a new three-year, $100 million deal with the Wolves, a source confirmed Sunday. There is a player option for the third year.

Both sides expressed a desire to get a deal done as the season went on. Randle played some of the best basketball of his career this season under coach Chris Finch and was a key reason the Wolves advanced to the Western Conference finals. He and his family are happy in Minnesota, and the Wolves liked how Randle fit in with the team since acquiring him and Donte DiVincenzo in the Karl-Anthony Towns trade with the Knicks before the start of last season.

Even amid the team’s early season struggles, Randle was never the scapegoat for that within the organization; the view was the whole team had to play better. Finch was always a proponent of Randle’s ability to morph into a point forward who could lift the offense not just with his scoring but with his playmaking. That vision took hold when Randle came back from a groin injury in the final quarter of the season.

The Wolves finished 17-4 over their last 21 games with Randle. Randle averaged 18.2 points and 5.2 assists over that span.

Then, in the playoffs, Randle was the Wolves’ most consistent player through two rounds. In the series against the Lakers and Warriors he averaged 23.9 points and 5.9 assists before the vicious Thunder defense grounded him and the rest of the Wolves offense to a halt in the Western Conference finals.

Randle’s new deal, along with one finalized with Naz Reid (five years, $125 million) on Friday, figures to keep the Wolves a couple of million dollars under the second apron of the collective bargaining agreement, and that was a goal of Wolves President Tim Connelly in free agency.

It also makes it even more unlikely that Nickeil Alexander-Walker is back in a Wolves uniform next season. Alexander-Walker is the a target of several teams in free agency, according to national reports, and he could make more than the midlevel exception of $14 million.

The Wolves would zoom past the second apron and encounter its various roster-building restrictions if they were to sign Alexander-Walker to that kind of money.

In other roster news, the Wolves declined team options for Luka Garza and Josh Minott, but a source said Garza could still end up back on the team on a minimum contract. The Wolves declined the options in the short term to provide financial and roster flexiblity as free agency is set to open Monday night.

With the money they have remaining under the second apron, the Wolves could use up to $5.7 million of the taxpayer midlevel exception to sign another player. They could target a point guard with that money and roster slot.