It feels good to feel good. When the Minnesota Timberwolves feel good it just … feels good. Feeling good isn’t a quick start or hot half. Feeling good isn’t one player going off while the rest of the team flounders on the fringes. Far too often the Wolves walked willingly into those snares. This was a real feel-good night, one where everybody got a lick of the ice cream and they all basked in the bursting flavors. It hasn’t happened enough this season, but it felt fucking good to feel good.
The game ends 136-115. A complete performance. Like seeing a unicorn prancing through your lawn or bigfoot in your bathroom. The Wolves have had big wins, bad losses and every morsel of madness in between, but they have had very few complete performances.
This was one of them, though. The game was scarcely a tussle for more than half a quarter before the Timberwolves kicked open the floodgates and allowed the deluge to sweep Atlanta into the deepest depths of oblivion.
For a night like this to happen, the team etching another notch into the loss column has to be bad and make no mistake the Hawks were horrendous. Inversely, the winners have to be great and the Wolves were every inch of great. Where Atlanta were sloppy and seemingly uninterested with ball in hand, Minnesota were precise and samurai-sharp. On the other side of the ball, the Hawks were leaking points profusely at the rim and somehow still leaving shooters open in every zone of the floor, while the Wolves had a stringent and successful plan to shut off Trae Young’s passing lanes and force him to carry the entire scoring burden.
The season’s crescendo is creeping closer and every win means more than the last. By the laws of that credo, this was a huge win. An important win. Mostly, it feels good to feel good, and this one felt good.
Mike Conley: 10/10
Surgical. Like a fucking scalpel with legs. Sliced into the flesh of Atlanta’s crestfallen defense and harvested their rotting organs all night long. All of his pick-and-roll craft was on show; subtle movements to lead defenders into the screen, changes of pace to get two feet in the paint, and to-die-for decision-making when choosing between floaters or lobs or kick-outs. It was a masterpiece of point guard play.
If there was ever a night to rubber-stamp his veteran impact on this team and justify his trade deadline inclusion, it was this one. If there was ever a night where a point guard slapped on his rubber gloves and hacked into a hapless patient, it was this one.
Finished with 21 points (78.1% TS) and 6 assists in 28 minutes — +30.6 net rating.
Anthony Edwards: 10/10
These nights of casual dominance are too frequent to ignore now. Nothing about this game jumped off the screen as his best game of the season or an all-time Edwards explosion, it almost seemed run of the mill, naught but a leisurely stroll through a sun-drenched park. And yet, every time you looked up he was doing something fucking spectacular.
Dunked on everybody. Just get out of the fucking way when he’s freight-training down the lane. When he wasn’t parasailing from the rafters, he was marinating defenders at the rim with crafty finishes and bully-ball forays that ended in free throw attempts. And when he wasn’t living at the coalface, he was making quick and smart playmaking decisions when Atlanta ran doubles at him or causing chaos as a Tasmanian Devil defender.
Casually.
Finished with 32 points (54.4% TS), 8 rebounds, 5 assists and 2 blocks in 36 minutes — +28.8 net rating.
Jaden McDaniels: 10/10
Atlanta’s defensive game plan got scorched into a pile of ashes when they put that fuzzy little fucking pygmy on him from the first tip. While Young stood watching helplessly like a balding fucking garden gnome, McDaniels shoved a rocket up his team’s ass and kickstarted them in the best way possible. He didn’t parlay his awesome start into anything overly exceptional, but he was remarkably efficient and cruised through Atlanta’s flimsy defensive barricades with minimal fuss.
Admittedly, Young got his offensively and McDaniels could have done more to prevent that, but there was clearly a game plan to funnel Atlanta’s speedy flopper into the mid-range/floater area and force him to beat them from that area and that area alone. McDaniels often played the matador for Young, but there was a consistent gaggle of hungry rim-protectors waiting behind the red flag.
He did his job and he did it with hilarious ease.
Finished with 19 points (87.3% TS) and 2 blocks in 26 minutes — +24.9 net rating.
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