A map will help with this. The Twin Cities are a contiguous urban core. Akron and Canton are more like satellites within the metro's gravity.

^ yes. the twin cities directly abut each other and share 6 linear miles of municipal border with each other. as the crow flies, the distance from downtown minneaplis to downtown st. paul is ~9 miles.

akron and canton do not come anywhere close to directly abutting cleveland (the municipal limits of cleveland and akron don't even get within 15 miles of each other, and for canton it's more like 40 miles, minimum) and the downtown downtown distances are considerably further than the twin cities.

downtown cleveland to downtown akron: ~30 miles
downtown cleveland to downtown cantown: ~51 miles



the relationships between these places are fundamentally different.