Man, let me tell you about this little adventure I had today with the New York Times Mini Crossword. The clue was “Washington NBA team,” and at first, I was like, “Oh, this is gonna be a piece of cake.” I mean, I follow basketball a bit, so I thought I had this in the bag.
So, I grabbed my phone and opened up the NYT app. You know how it is, you get that little rush when you see a fresh crossword puzzle waiting for you. Anyway, I scrolled through the clues, looking for that one about the Washington NBA team. Found it pretty quickly, and my brain immediately started flipping through the roster of teams in my head.

- First thought, “Is it the Bullets?” Nah, that’s old school, they changed that name a while back.
- Then I was like, “Maybe it’s a trick question?” You know how the Times can be sometimes with their wordplay.
- Started running through other possibilities in my mind, but nothing was clicking.
I decided to do a quick search online just to see if anything popped up, and boom, there it was. It was like the internet just handed me the answer on a silver platter. A couple of websites had this exact clue listed, and they all said the same thing.
Wizards
Of course! The Washington Wizards! How could I forget? I guess I just needed that little nudge. I typed in “WIZARDS” into the puzzle, and it fit perfectly. Felt pretty good, not gonna lie. It’s funny how sometimes you just need to see something written out to remember it.
It was a bit of a rollercoaster, thinking it would be super easy, then getting stumped, and finally getting that “aha!” moment. But hey, that’s what makes these crosswords fun, right? It’s always a little challenge, and it’s always satisfying when you finally crack the code. And I gotta say, it was pretty cool to see that so many other people were searching for the same answer online. We’re all in this together, figuring out these clues one by one!