It feels like an identity is being assembled. A team who often found itself in flux last season feels more like one that understands its own fiber this season. No solid structure can be fabricated on a sludgy bedrock, and eventually the Wolves collapsed under the weight of their own identity crisis last season. This feels more stable. This feels like a foundation worth building upon. Bad nights will occur — likely more than we all want — but with a strong backbone to rely on, these games against the middling fodder of the league become pleasant strolls more frequently.
The game ends 123-95. It wasn’t wire-to-wire dominance but it was dominance nonetheless. In games like this it’s all about taking care of business and Minnesota took care of business. Most importantly, they did it with that identity. Even when the Utah Jazz pushed back and attempted to steal this one away, that identity never withered. They strangled Utah’s offense, they relied on their big guns to carry the water offensively, and they kept their foot on the pedal all night long.
That’s what the best version of this Timberwolves team looks like. It begins with defense, the asphyxiating and unyielding defense. Not only do they have the personnel to ruin a team’s night — particularly in the halfcourt — but now they feel like they’re on a string and moving as one cohesive defensive organism. They breathe together as one and they move together as one and they hunt together as one. When a cog sputters, the one beside him kicks it up a notch. That’s the identity.
And that allows the offense to blossom at their naturally slower pace. It doesn’t truly need to be a consistent eruption on that end, they just need to tick along and let the defense tie the noose around the necks of the opponents. In this one, Utah couldn’t find a rhythm offensively for all but a small stint in the second quarter and once Minnesota’s scoring roots started to sprout, they paraded to the finish line with graceful aplomb.
An identity win worth remembering. In a perfect world, it’s a sign of things to come.
Mike Conley: 8/10
There’s an art to weaving one’s impact onto a game without dominating as a scorer or a playmaker, especially as a point guard in today’s NBA. Mike Conley is that artist. His brushstrokes are elegant and his motif is seemingly timeless. There are a lot of miles in those legs but there is even more nous swirling around his basketball brain.
This game, one where he struggled to find his usual rhythm as a floater specialist and knockdown shooter, rubber-stamped the notion that those things don’t truly matter for him to be effective.
It’s because the shots he did make come in a timely manner right when the Jazz were humming. The passing is smart and laced with unselfishness, even when it doesn’t end in that guillotine assist. And his defense, oh his defense, the sort of orgasmic brilliance that puts hairs on your fucking chest.
Father Time be damned, he sprints around unrelentingly when chasing shooters and he hounds as an on-ball defender. All game every game. There are bigger defensive reputations around him, but Conley often leads the defensive line and does so wonderfully.
He’s awesome.
Finished with 7 points (38.9% TS), 3 rebounds and 6 assists in 28 minutes — +41.1 net rating.
Anthony Edwards: 10/10
Quietly one of his best-ever regular season games. One of the catalog. This was manicured mastery. The six turnovers can be quibbled about but they were but minor missteps in a night that bristled with bombastic resplendence. He just kept coming at the Utah Jazz. Kept driving his pickaxe into their fucking skulls.
He was outstanding in the opening moments of the night and he was there to frolic on Utah’s grave in the fourth quarter. And all the things in between were just as effective.
From a scoring standpoint, he struck a better balance in his shot selection. There were still some mid-range attempts that he probably wouldn’t have taken in previous years (although he made them in this one) but he still found time to smash apart Walker Kessler’s big goofy rim-defense and get up a quartet of triples. That’s what he does. Loves scoring points, doesn’t he? Can’t get enough of scoring fucking heaps of points.
In this one, though, he did the other things as well. Not only did he do them, he used them as a way to throttle that big fucking dope Kessler and his hapless Jazz. Edwards had his head in the trough as a rebounder, pigging out on contested boards particularly in the telling third period. He also made a bunch of sick passing reads; the lob to Rudy Gobert the pick of the bunch.
When he wasn’t doing all of those things. He had Utah’s perimeter scorers in the seventh circle of hell. Welcome to the fiery depths of the underworld, Talen Horton-Tucker, you pudgy shot-chucking fuck. Come and join him, Jordan Clarkson. This is Anthony Edwards’ world, you’re just taking up space, lads.
Finished with 31 points (61.5% TS), 8 rebounds and 6 assists in 36 minutes — +38.0 net rating.
Jaden McDaniels: 4/10
Fouled a bunch. Fouled a ton. Fouled until his fucking heart gave out and the referees rightfully disqualified him from proceedings. He’s never been able to dodge the ominous tendrils of the whistle, but it seems like he is in a fouling funk — even for him — to begin this season. Along with the calf injury that has limited his minutes and assumedly output, it’s just been a weird start for a player who just got a big fat pay rise.
He just needs to foul less. That sounds overly simple from a couch’s vantage point, but that’s the truth. Whatever he needs to do to get to that point is largely irrelevant, he just needs to get to it. Maybe hot yoga or some shit.
Finished with 5 points (62.5% TS) in 20 minutes — +24.4 net rating.
Karl-Anthony Towns: 9/10
It feels like he is building into the season. Not in a smooth, unfettered skyrocketing manner, but in a way that requires sweat and drudgery. Even on this night, his best of the season, things didn’t seem to come easy. That’s how the long season is sometimes, though, and Towns is beginning to plow through the difficulties he’s been facing.
The third quarter was the one where the puzzle pieces that have seemed jagged and unfitting finally begun to click together. He had John Collins’ measure all night but that post-halftime flurry of post moves, zone-breaking mid-post work, and top-of-the-arc triples broke the back of Utah and they were never able to walk properly again. That’s sweat equity. That’s learning to swim through the swampy muck he’s been stuck in.
And, to be fair, even when the offense has been erratic, the defense has been stout. Impressively stout. And again it was in this one. He moved his feet swiftly on the perimeter while knowing when to revert back to a big man who protects the rim and rotates as a low-man. Most importantly, he’s hardly ever a rogue link in the chain. He moves and breathes with the organism.
They still need more from him, but it feels like he’s on the verge of delivering it.
Finished with 25 points (67.9% TS), 7 rebounds and 2 steals in 32 minutes — +39.1 net rating.
Rudy Gobert: 9/10
If Minnesota’s identity as a defensive powerhouse is starting to come to fruition, it’s because he is at the center of it. It revolves around him. He’s a big French fucking sun.
There’s only so long we can refer to this version of himself without just accepting it as the norm. Last season was the outlier. He’s been doing this shit for a decade and it shouldn’t be surprising that he is doing it again. He’s the best defender on the best defense right now and it’s been invigorating to watch him pummel offenses into a pile of bones.
Now, instead of moving like he needs a Zimmer frame he moves like a big gangly fucking gazelle. The play where he blows up the lob dunk and then hightails it to the corner to block a 3-pointer sums it all up. Last season his defensive brain still worked at its peak, but his body couldn’t keep up with it. This season they’re all in sync and they’re back to being the league’s most fearsome rim-protecting duo.
All night he made those athletic and smart plays. The lob dunks, the defensive rotations, the bursty pick-and-roll pirouettes into a scoring pocket. The whole lot. He’s just very much back and he’s making it impossible to ignore.
Finished with 11 points (50.6% TS), 10 rebounds and 4 blocks in 29 minutes — +15.8 net rating.
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