Opening night just feels a little different. This season, the Minnesota Timberwolves have a different feel about them, too, and that only stirred the opening night potion further. The air is thick with excitement, the throng pours into Target Center without the slightest bit of Wolves classical conditioning wafting from them, every point and rebound and assist feels like home again. It’s sex for the basketball soul.
That doesn’t mean the brand of basketball is going to end up in any textbooks. The rust is still being sanded off and, for the Wolves especially, there are chemistry puzzles to piece together. But it’s opening night, and it feels fucking good to be back.
The game ends 115-108. At times it felt like this was the first paces of what will be a steamrolling juggernaut and, at others, it seemed like a bunch of dudes playing pickup. The Oklahoma City Thunder were feisty — a swift reminder that organizations tank but players don’t — but after getting on top by 16 points midway through the third quarter, Minnesota were very nearly the architects of their own demise. They ended up down by six points in that same third period, and the chemistry wheels that chugged so swimmingly in the first 24 minutes started to sputter and crumble.
Still, talent finds a way. The Wolves have that in truckloads. They clawed back into the lead and never relinquished it again. Some hairy moments? yes. Some worrisome signs? perhaps. A big fat steaming win for the good guys? You bet.
D’Angelo Russell: 8/10
Tickled the twine when it counted. Sure, there were some sloppy turnovers early on as he tried desperately to cement the connection between himself and Rudy Gobert — and they never really did gel in this one — but this polarizing fucker can put the ball in the hoop when it’s really time to put the ball in the hoop.
He attacked the rim more than he usually does and showed off his feathery touch and willingness to absorb and even embrace contact. He got to the line a fistful of times. And he nailed a pair of jumpers when the Thunder were hemming the Wolves in and beating the living shit out of them.
It wasn’t a perfect night for the man whose blood made up of mostly stalactites, but it was an important one.
Finished with 20 points (54.9% TS), 5 rebounds and 2 assists in 35 minutes — -10.8 net rating.
Anthony Edwards: 4/10
Once again he flashed a passing upside we’ve rarely seen in his first two seasons and, aside from a pair of off-ball mishaps, he acted as a roving piece of magmatic rock while checking the saucy Shai Gilgeous-Alexander. At some point, though, he needs those newfound strengths to be complementary skills to his scoring ability. You know, the one that we’ve seen shatter the fucking earth into a billion tiny pieces.
That just wasn’t there in this outing. He struggled to create space for any sort of jump shooting clinic — and his shots looked leggy when he did launch them — and he looked tentative playing cat and mouse in pick-and-roll. Then there was the rim. The fucking rim that had an iron shield strapped over it. Even when he was able to bulldoze his way into the lane, he just could not get anything to puncture that shield. Miss after miss, clank after clank. Just a rough night doing what he usually does best.
Finished with 11 points (29.3% TS), 8 rebounds and 7 assists in 32 minutes — +9.9 net rating.
Jaden McDaniels: 10/10
What more could you want?
Like a baby giraffe learning to use its growing body. Skeletal limbs starting to move with more grace and more style and more substance. Like watching your child grow up in front of your eyes. Even without his 3-point shot falling, he was so aggressive attacking off the bounce, he lived at the line, and he buried a couple of well-oiled mid-range moves that put a big fucking exclamation mark on his summer development.
And, of course, he is still good at defense. Scarily good. Smothered SGA, smothered Josh Giddey. Smothered anybody stupid enough to get within his 16-foot limbs. He causes chaos. He has always caused stone-faced chaos. Now he is starting to master it.
Finished with 19 points (66% TS), 6 rebounds, 3 assists, 3 steals and 2 blocks in 36 minutes — +16.1 net rating.
Karl-Anthony Towns: 6/10
Spent the first half of the game moonlighting as Magic Johnson in a raging tornado. Slinging passes to every quadrant of the court. Linking with Gobert to form the biggest fucking slice of heaven imaginable. Knocking down triples and generally just being a pseudo point guard on a team who were humming. It was everything we expected to see from the Northern Heights and a good chunk more.
Spent the second half regressing to the bad Karl-Anthony Towns. The one that gets stuck in the mud of frustration. The one that spends his time flailing for fouls and spewing madness when he doesn’t get them. The one that kicks out on jump shots as if that has ever fucking worked for him.
His shot, on the few times he did shoot it, was always spotty throughout the night, but opposing teams find making big runs a lot easier when Towns is in meltdown mode. Preferably, we will see more of the first half KAT going forward.
Finished with 12 points (49.7% TS), 6 rebounds and 7 assists in 36 minutes — -6.7 net rating.
Rudy Gobert: 10/10
There would be adult film stars who would have been overwhelmed by the sheer volume of balls coming toward him in the opening quarter of the game. He’s the shiny new toy in the organization and they treated him as such. Post-ups, lobs, deep-seals, dribble handoffs. It’s not like he didn’t enjoy it, though. He thrived in it. He stood under that spotlight and basked in its fucking glory.
Then, as the game tightened around Minnesota’s throat, he thrust his real value into that light. Those offensive traits were still prominent, but he stepped up his defensive aura and started to barricade the rim. When players attacked him he parried them away like meaningless flies, but most of the time OKC just gave up on attacking the rim altogether. Except for poor Alexis Pokusevski had to find out the hard way. He just kept going at him and failing in more hilarious ways each time. Weird test tube baby looking fuck.
Finished with 23 points (76.9% TS), 16 rebounds and 2 assists in 30 minutes — +20.5 net rating.
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