Flip Saunders remains optimistic about the Minnesota Timberwolves re-signing Nikola Pekovic, but he says the two sides are going through a process where the organization is laying out to the free agent why he should accept the current proposal.

“Right now we’re going through maybe an education process [with] Pek and his people of where we’re at with our organization and his importance to us and where we feel we’re at with what our offer is and why we’ve offered him what we’ve offered,” Saunders said. “There’s nothing that has been adversarial, it’s more of an education situation right now, and I’m optimistic that we’ll sign him.

"Right now we’re in a situation where he’s a restricted free agent and so he can go out and get an offer sheet from anybody and get a contract, but we have the ability to match any offer that he can get."

Saunders believes the Timberwolves have given Pekovic a strong offer.

"I do believe that Glen [Taylor, Wolves owner] and our organization, that we’ve presented a very fair, more than fair offer to Pek," Saunders said. "We’ll just see where it goes and how soon it gets taken care of.”