Minnesota Timberwolves

A big crowd turned out for Kevin Garnett's return but couldn't light a fire under the home team.

Brock Lesnar is used to pummeling opponents to oblivion, but even he was cringing as Kevin Garnett put a sleeper hold on his former team after halftime.

Al Jefferson fired off 23 points, but the Wolves fell victim to a slow second-half start in Friday's 95-78 home loss to the Celtics. Sebastian Telfair added 13 points.

Chronicle the Gameday coverage including updates live from the Target Center for a comprehensive look at the Wolves contest against Boston tonight at 7 PM.

After missing nearly half of the 2007-0-8 season, Wolves guard Randy Foye is looking to put together a solid, complete year.

"I didn't know that," Garnett said. "But who cares?"

Clearly not Garnett, who received a ton of love from the Target Center fans. He wanted to let everyone know that he really appreciated it, too, which I thought was classy. But it's easy to be magnanimous when you're a member of the championship Boston Celtics.

 

Veteran guard Kevin Ollie missed his second consecutive game because of an injured calf.

 

"[Jefferson] is a terrific kid, a joy to coach," Rivers said before the game. "If you look at where he was when he started with us, and where he is now, it's awesome to see. He's become one of the top-scoring bigs in our league. I feel part of it as far as our relationship, but players have to do the required work to be great. All of us give them a list to work on, and Al did all that. It was that work in the darkness, by himself, that's what makes guys better.

 

Wolves record: 2-9

Box Score

 

 

He was introduced first and received a standing ovation, but nothing compared to the thunderous welcome he got in his first game back in this building last February, though he did not play with an abdominal injury.

"It's just another team that I play against,'' Garnett said. "I don't put no more or no less than that into it.''

But Boston coach Doc Rivers wasn't buying that for one second...

"Oh, the humanity!" Big Brock was alleged to bellow as the quarter came to a close with Rajon Rondo's buzzer-beating three-pointer.

 

An audio recap of Wolves/Celtics.

In Monday's blog, I questioned whether Big Al would be a leader on this team.  Perhaps Al is a reader of Wolves Watch, because he had one of his best fourth quarters of the season and prevented his team from surrendering another lead.  Jefferson was all over the paint, creating opportunities for both himself and his teammates.  When the Sixers threatened to spoil yet another game for us, #25 found #33 for a sweet three pointer with thirty seconds left that was essentially the nail in the coffin.

Finally, we are starting to see some returns from the Miller/Love trade.  Love has already made some contributions in his limited role on this roster, but Miller was brought in to be the go-to shooter in situations just like the ones the Wolves have found themselves in numerous times this season and were in again on Wednesday night. 

On Wednesday morning, when Fred Hoiberg was on KFAN's Paul Allen show, the former three-point specialist pontificated on the ensuing game and had a few keys for a Wolves victory:

1.  Get Miller going - Miller is the team's best shooter, possibly the best playmaker, and can spread the floor to give better looks to Al.  He can't be afraid to take more shots than he's been taking so far.

2.  Keep a quick pace going in the fourth quarter.  The offense has really bogged down, whether it be from a different look on defense or just a lack of focus.  The Wolves have worked on sprinting down the court and keeping the pressure on the defense.

3.  Play solid defense against the Sixers' bigs, Samuel Dalembert and Elton Brand.  Kevin Love will be tested once again against these veterans.

Well, put a half of a check mark next to number one, because Miller still only took 7 shots and didn't do much at all in the second half, but he did score those three crucial points with 30 seconds left in the game. 

The Wolves pace on offense was fine in the fourth quarter, it was their defenseive letdowns that almost killed them.  The tempo of the offense should be largely dictated by the point guard, but it helps when you have a group on the court who are all on the same page.  We saw the Wolves win this one with a cohesive unit on the court as opposed to a musical chairs sort of offensive rotation.  It was Foye, Miller, Gomes, and Jefferson with a pretty even rotation at the center position between Craig Smith, Kevin Love, and Jason Collins.  Smith, by the way, had his best game of the season and finally justified the minutes he got tonight.  I think having a regular group of starters out there will help the team keep the pace they want on offense.

They did a pretty good job on Brand considering he was the guy through which the Sixers offense ran, and Brand only went to the line 4 times while Dalembert didn't make a single trip to the line.  Although the Wolves shot just just over 73% from the free throw stripe, they went made more trips than the Sixers, who shot just 65%.

Next up for the Wolves?  KG and the Celtics in what will be The Ticket's first time playing in Target Center in something other than a Wolves jersey.  Storylines aside, the Celtics are a better team than the Timberwolves and shouldn't have too much of a problem dispatching the now 2-8 team.  Let's just celebrate a victory while we still can.  

  

Star Tribune staff writer Brian Stensaas had a few good notes worth posting on Jerry Zgoda's blog from Tuesday's practice:

Good day. And that's not just a greeting. Those were the exact words Timberwolves coach Randy Wittman described today's practice, a day before taking on the Sixers at home. Wittman said, despite a 1-8 record, the mentality of the team remains positive.

The Wolves went through the usual motions today, allowing the media in to see a little bit of scrimmaging and then some after-practice individual work.

- Brian Cardinal and Mark Madsen did a good bit of running.

- Kevin Love worked on perimeter shooting.
- Corey Brewer, Ryan Gomes and Randy Foye did some quick pass, quick shoot work.
- Rashad McCants lifted weights.

This a day after the team pretty much worked on its own. No official practice was held Monday.

Love worked on perimeter shooting?  I believe Kevin McHale's masterful teaching ability on low post technique should take precedent.  We need somebody with a good drop step more than a player who can play with versatility on offense that can give defenders something to worry about.

Maybe the biggest problem is that when practicing fourth quarter defense, we're going against our own inept offense that suffers from poor shooting, inability to adapt to what the defense is showing, and some old fashioned bad luck.  It's hard to get an idea of what it's like to go against the top flite teams when you're scrimmaging with players that aren't starters on a 1-9 team - the only way to get better is to go out there and do it against real competition.

I'm glad that the Wolves had a "good day", let's just hope it translates into a good result after Wednesday night's game.  The Wolves will have their hands full against a 76ers team that is on a three game winning streak and just made mince meat of the Thunder.  They don't have anyone that particularly scares you, but Thaddeus Young is coming off two really nice games in his second NBA season and leads the team in scoring this year.  He was drafted 5 spots ahead of Corey Brewer, who played for just 8 minutes against Denver.  Another McHale blunder?  Probably.  I really can't wait until KG comes to town soon to stick it to Glen Taylor just one more time.

 

Last Monday, the Wolves stood at 1-5 and had been beaten down emotionally by deflating losses to Sacramento and Portland.  This Monday, the psychological duress that the players have surely undergone in search of a victory to snap this losing streak has to be even worse than in the previous week.

Sunday night, the Nuggets were able to hold serve on their home court against the Timberwolves with a 90-84 victory.  Seemingly given new life with the Billups-Iverson swap, the Nuggets may be a team to be reckoned with once again this year if they can continue to improve on defense, an area they have been weak at in previous years but seem to be figuring out a little bit in '08.  It's surprising that the Nuggets' defense would improve with the loss of Marcus Camby, but they had 8 steals and 6 blocks against the Wolves and rank 8th in the NBA in defensive efficiency.  Only the Lakers average more steals per game this year than the Nuggets, who also rank in the top ten in opponents' turnovers.

It was that defense along with good free throw shooting that helped the Nuggets shut down the Wolves in the fourth quarter on Sunday night and made Randy Wittman's night behind the podium that much tougher.  I can't imagine how hard it is for him to keep coming up with new ways to explain the same old frustrating aspects of this largely inexperienced team, and there's nothing he can say at this point that's going to be some epiphany about the team's struggles.

One thing he seems to be doing now, as he often did last year, is experimenting with the lineup, ideally to get a group on the floor that displays some cohesion.  11 different Timberwolves saw the floor for Wittman tonight, and only 3 of the 5 starters ended up playing more than 20 minutes by game's end.  Wittman seems dead set on making Randy Foye work out at point guard, and although he played pretty well at stretches against Denver, he hasn't been the guy to steer this team in the right direction when the game really matters.  (His turnover to Brandon Roy on Saturday night is still at the forefront of my brain.)

It's not uncommon to see a team in the midst of a long losing streak lose at least a couple of games by wide margins, but the fact that the Wolves should have beaten Golden State, had a legitimate shot at Denver, and probably could have beaten Portland had Brandon Roy been on vacation shows they haven't completely given up.  It'll be troubling if games like the 121-109 loss to Sacramento start to become the rule rather than the exception, because at least when it's close you know that if the Wolves could just stop being the Wolves for a second they would be able get a win under their belts.

I don't believe the team has reached rock bottom yet, but this week's losses are about as hard to stomach as any.  It's got to be a helpless feeling for a group of professionals who are trying to latch onto something to feel good about and to give them confidence going into pressure situations.  The main thing to remember is that it's way, way too early to give up on a season, and it's still very possible that positive things will come out of the '08-09 campaign, even if the win total isn't at the 40 win mark that Kevin McHale predicted the team would be able to reach.  Somebody needs to step up as the leader of the team - one of the scariest things I heard Randy Wittman say in an interview on the Chad Hartman Show was that the Wolves are lacking any sort of established leadership - and don't necessarily expect that guy to be Big Al.  Lack of leadership has to be a contributing factor to the fourth quarter breakdowns this team has experienced (although having KG's leadership didn't seem to help much in that department while he was here) and is something the coaches and players are going to have to figure out quick. 

It's a pair of east coast teams up next for the Wolves as they take on Philadelphia and Boston at home before traveling to Detroit next Sunday to wrap up the week.