A pulse. A flash of brilliance. Sustained stretches of it. A small sampling of the brilliance that has been heavily shrouded all season long. A stumble. A fall. An opponent wreaking supernatural havoc. A reminder of how quickly this league can turn cruising into catastrophic. An exhale. Most importantly, a much-needed win. It was a melting pot of emotions in Cleveland, but the Minnesota Timberwolves needed to scratch and claw their way to a notch in the win column. They just needed to.
The game ends 129-124. It probably shouldn’t have been that hard — it certainly shouldn’t have been that hard against a Cavaliers team who didn’t have two of their three best players — but for a team who had been struggling to keep pace with … well … anybody, there is little room for fault-finding about a road win.
Even with a cataclysmic fourth quarter that saw what was once a 24-point lead dwindle down to two still fresh in the mind, this felt like a giant leap in the right direction for much of the night. The Wolves found a sizzling chemistry offensively, knocked down their shots (finally) and transferred that energy onto the defensive end. If it wasn’t for Darius Garland’s absurd shot-making performance, this might have been a laugher. Still, for a squad whose mental fortitude has been heavily and rightfully questioned thus far, perhaps a grind-it-out win was just as beneficial.
D’Angelo Russell: 9/10
Snatched the devil off his shoulder and choked it to death. Exorcised it with pure shot-making and point guard mastery. This was progression to the mean with a fucking exclamation point on the end of it.
And it started from minute one. An explosion right out of the gate. A smattering of mid-range jumpers fused with a fistful of long-range ones. From there, the tendrils of his game branched into crisp pick-and-roll playmaking and expert floor generalship. There were still defensive misadventures and some shot selection issues in the fourth quarter, but this was a wonderful bounce back.
Finished with 30 points (84.6% FG), 2 rebounds and 12 assists in 35 minutes — +19 plus-minus.
Anthony Edwards: 3/10
Continues to oscillate between fucking brilliant and fucking absent. A rubber band of inconsistency slapping back and fort. A scoring maniac one night and a plastic bag drifting aimlessly in the breeze another. Unfortunately, this game was much of the latter. While the wheels of the team as a whole were thoroughly greased, he was on the outskirts.
Saved his night with a smooth cut that finished with a two-handed poster while Cleveland were on their fourth-quarter run and the most important field goal of the night — a big-balled mid-range jumper — as time game time was vanishing. Overall, however, it was a quiet night by his lofty standards.
Finished with 10 points (38.5% FG) and 7 rebounds in 31 minutes — -11 plus-minus.
Jaden McDaniels: 5/10
The final period was a microcosm of his season. There was the glorious — the increased willingness to exert his athleticism evidenced by his attempted murder of a hapless Lamar Stevens, the multiple-effort plays that saw him get to the line, recover loose balls, and pin a surefire layup against the backboard in crunch time. But, there was the horrendous, too — the boneheaded fouls, the over-aggressiveness at the point of attack defensively, the inconsistent offensive output.
Before that topsy-turvy fourth, he was largely limited, expending most of his energy trying to suffocate the fucking flamethrower that was Darius Garland. The highs are breathtakingly high, but there are still too many crushing lows.
Finished with 9 points (44.4% FG) and 2 rebounds in 31 minutes — -13 plus-minus.
Karl-Anthony Towns: 9/10
Another one who needed to bounce back. After a string of underwhelming performances and putrid displays of leadership, he needed to be a big part of a win. He needed to be the straw that stirs the drink. And he was. It never felt like he was the main character of the night, but he was virtually unguardable and was there to make a play whenever his team needed him to.
The 16-point third period was dope. Like a big bag of skill sprinkled all over the Quicken Loans Arena. But it was his contributions to tourniquet the bleeding in the fourth that meant the most. The driving dunk late, the over-the-shoulder deftness to set up Edwards’ aforementioned dunk, the calmness he exuded when things seemed to be crumbling around him. That hasn’t always been his modus operandi, which makes it shine even brighter when it does happen. This game was a big bright spotlight on his strange season.
Finished with 29 points (68.8% FG), 13 rebounds and 3 assists in 37 minutes — +15 plus-minus.
Rudy Gobert: 8/10
We have seen all the extremes of his game so far this season. We’ve seen the outlier peaks where he cracks open a big can of scoring punch and we’ve seen the horrible lows where he feels more like a burden than a boon. We haven’t seen a whole lot of this kind of night, though. This was the consistently fucking consistent Rudy Gobert that graced the hardwood in Utah for all those years.
He was just everything he has always been. A force around the rim, a big French gravitational pull as a roll-man, a defensive genius at the rim. He wasn’t the showstopper — good or bad — but he was constantly doing those things that make him great. In the end, he finishes with a neat box score and dozens of plays that will never see the stat sheet.
Finished with 15 points (50% FG), 13 rebounds and 2 blocks in 33 minutes — -13 plus-minus.
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