Looking for today's Connections answer for puzzle #443 from August 27, a little harder than yesterday's answer, this puzzle from Connections Companion has a difficulty rating of 34 out of 5

We update our Connections clues and hints daily And if the hints are not enough, see the four answers below, along with the category title and related words In addition, for those of you reading this in a different time zone, I have included a reflection on yesterday's puzzle, #442

There are spoilers for connection #443 Only those who want to know the answer to today's connection should read on

Alternatively, see our NYT Connections How to Play Guide for tips on how to solve the puzzle without our help

While today's wordle solution guide recommends the best wordle starting words as a strategy, the Connections solution depends on identifying the categories that are connected from the 16 words The difficulty of each category is represented by a color, with yellow being the easiest grouping and purple the most difficult Hints are helpful as the answer is displayed after four wrong guesses

If you need a hint to solve the groupings, here are each theme in order of difficulty:

If you read these hints, you should at least find the answer to today's connection If not, please continue reading for larger hints Also, if you only want to know the answer, scroll down further

Here's a bigger clue: instead of looking for an NBA team, think spiciness and the sound of rain, and look back at your collection before you get a haircut

Now, what's the answer to today's Game 443 connection?

Drum roll, please

I honestly don't think I've ever been more confused when you put the Clippers, Thunder, Heat, and Magic together for an instant strike Turns out it was an obvious trap

After moving on from that strike, I started with Heat, looked at Fire and Spice, and quickly found a kick in the green category

Yellow quickly followed with thunder, boom, crash and roar

I was trying to put together a nail salon connection with clippers, gel, brushes, and sets when I took another hit It didn't work

Somehow, that brought me to baseball cards, then magic, sets, and tarot There is a card game called sets, and one could say card sets, but I don't like that term for this connection

Blue became a memorizing fill with brushes, capes, clippers, and gel, like in a barbershop

Are you reading this late in the day? According to the Connections Companion, this is the Connections solution to game #442, which had a difficulty level of 3 out of 5

The green category was my #1 today It's what I thought of when I connected bagels, lifesavers, tires, and wreaths

The yellow category was next First I found Blessing, then started looking for other words related to religion; once I found Consent, I realized that all four were related to authorization

I stumbled upon Solving Blue I tried to connect Slice and Loaf as dealing with bread, but that didn't work, so I tried words that sounded like action verbs to shake something: Hook, Shank, Slice, Whiff hook, shank, slice, whiff It never entered my mind that the “something” was a golf club But even a broken clock is probably right twice a day

So the purple had to be filled in by rote memorization, which worked well for me since I never understand categories involving homonyms or missing letters/sounds And today's was particularly tricky