The daily digest of Twin Cities culture | Secrets of the City

Game #54, Home Game #27: Minnesota 105, Indiana 112

Game #55, Home Game #28: Minnesota 108, LA Lakers 111

Season Record: 18-37

1. The Closing Circle

There are those who checked out after Jefferson went down, and perhaps they are the smart ones. The Wolves have dropped four out of five since then against relatively mediocre competition and figure to chug in somewhere between last year's 22 wins and three or four more as a sign of "progress." The fair-weather fans may have stuck their heads out for a glimpse in January, but in the long run, and especially since Big Al heard that "pop," this season has become like every other one not coached by Flip Saunders--with a dwindling fan base in it as much for the glory and satisfactions of the game as for the team.

On those terms, then, Minnesota's loss to Indiana was absolutely dreadful, and tonight's nip-and-tuck defeat to the conference champs from the left coast a tonic--on the order of cheap champagne--for the soul.

First let's dispense with that Pacers monstrosity. You know things are bad when 17 different players score points in the first quarter (look it up), which must be some kind of a record. At the end of the period, the Pacers were playing Diener, Baston, Rush, Nesterovic and Daniels, while the Wolves countered with Foye, Collins, Smith, Ollie and Carney. Tell me, who after Foye is the second-best, and then third-best player among that group, and why? If you are even trying to formulate an answer, you have an unhealthy love for NBA hoops and may god have mercy on your PF Flyers.

I am quite certain that Randy Foye had the worst 36 point game I've ever witnessed. Foye didn't get on the board until the first period was half over and the Wolves were down 6. He got 26 of his 36 in what amounted to a pair of garbage times at the end of each half: a stretch of 5:34 late in the second when he got 12, which had absolutely no effect on Indiana's 13-point lead; and the final 8:49 of the 4th, when he racked up 14, closing the gap from 19 to the final 7-point spread. Like the rest of his team, but especially Mike Miller, he did a lot of dribbling and dishing, dribbling and dishing, dribbling and dishing. Sometimes--too many times--the dishing was to the other team. Miller finished with 5 assists and 7 turnovers; Foye had 3 dimes and five miscues. Kevin McHale, who showed great restraint is dubbing the game "funky," offered up this simple rebuttal to the way the Wolves seemed to pass up open jumpers for more dribble-and-kick all night: On a typical possession, you can usually get one guy open. It is rare that there will be two guys open. If you are going to dribble [under those circumstances], most of the time you are going to dribble into a crowd.

A possible silver lining of all this dribbling and kicking was that Minnesota earned its way to the free throw line 41 times...and made 23 of those shots, meaning a franchise record 18 freebies were clanked by seven different players. Leading the miss parade was Craig Smith with a 3-8 performance at the charity stripe, to go with his 0-3 FG and 3 turnovers en route to a minus -18 ledger is a mere 10:23 of play.

Two nights later, the Rhino epitomized the renaissance of a gritty Wolves spirit that gave a taciturn Lakers ballclub the shivers before finally succumbing. One of the hallmarks of the Flip Saunders era was exploiting an advantageous matchup until the opponent adjusted, and when Smith found himself being guarded by forward Josh Powell--who had some pretty fair games against the Wolves last season while playing for the Clips--he went on a rampage. The first eleven points of the second period belonged to the pint-sized power forward with the flak jacket, and pretty much all of them came on the same play: Ollie and Jason Collins would execute a pick and roll, with the Lakers shrewdly not even bothering to look at Collins on the roll, but suddenly pinching in on Ollie, who would deliver to Smith, the other big, on a rudimentary dish that seemed to perplex the hell out of Powell (or was the Laker scheme to blame?). In a 101 second span from 10:15 to 8:34 of the second, Smith had four buckets (two layups, a 7' and a 5'), each on Ollie dimes. It was so much more pleasant, simple, and effective, than watching Timberwolves pinball around the wings dribbling and contorting themselves backwards for passes and then repeating the process ad nauseum. This time, the repetition was Collins/Ollie pick and roll, Ollie dish, Smith bucket. At the end of the evening, the Rhino was a fat 9-10 FG, and while zero assists and four turnovers marred the stat sheet to the point where he finished a mere zero on the +/- scale, he did get off the best line of the night when I asked him in the posgame locker room about the pick-and-roll variations that sprung him. "Yeah, I sort of Pink Panthered my way inside," Smith said witth a gleam in his eye, his cracked ribs temporarily forgotten. Slink on, Rhino, slink on.

Smith wasn't the only one rejuvenated on Sunday. Bassy Telfair followed up his putrid 1-9 FG night versus the Pacers with an eye-opening 9-17 FG against the purple and gold. But in truth, the whole team seemed more in sway and sync with each other. No doubt the Lakers' blatant overconfidence was a factor. Having poured in 132 points the last time the two ballclubs met three weeks ago, and perhaps knowing that a Pacers squad without Granger and Dunleavy hung 112 on Minnesota 48 hours earlier--the 6th straight game in which Minnesota had ceded at least 47% FG and 100+ points--LA simply didn't bother to defend consistently, preferring to rely on their ample firepower in a casual shootout. Bluntly put, they figured that if worst came to worst, Kobe Bryant would bail them out.

But Kobe had one of his worst games versus the Wolves, his 28-6-7 line nearly as misleading as Foye's 36 points from the previous game. The stat sheet handed out to the media at the end of the third period showed him with 7 turnovers and yet his final tally was 6, so some "error" was corrected; but in truth, the MVP charged on Jason Collins in the 4th--ran him right over--and didn't garner a whistle, one of many blown calls from the incompetent refs. Right after that non-call, he kept going and clanked a jumper which Lamar Odom tipped in. He missed a potentially crucial free throw. He had his shot blocked on a monster skywalk by Rodney Carney. Overall, it simply wasn't Kobe's night: he went 2-6 FG in the 4th while his teammates shot 8-17 FG, and picked up five of the team's six assists besides.

When it was over, both teams had shot 50% (Minnesota) or better (52.4% by the Lakers) deploying laissez-faire D that made for a highly entertaining 4th period. With the Wolves down 3 with 3:40 to play, Foye buried what looked like (and was initially ruled) a trey, with his foot slightly over the line. Out of a Laker timeout, Luke Walton countered with a three to boost the lead up to 4. On the next possession, a Mike Miller trey bounced it back to a one-point contest, only to have Derek Fisher answer with his own trey on LA's next possession--and Gomes's three when the Wolves came back down the floor. Kobe hit a turnaround two, and Bassy responded with an uncontested finger roll. In a span of 2:04, the teams had scored 8 points apiece--crunchtime H-O-R-S-E. And the folks who questioned their priorities after the Pacer loss walked out knowing that an undermanned Minnesota ballclub had kept it close all the way through--the biggest lead for either team from start to finish was 6 points. Maybe those fair-weather folks stopping by to see Kobe will come back for more.

2. Second-guessing McHale

Kevin McHale has mostly earned his coaching honeymoon. His ballclub executed a dramatic turnaround shortly after he took over and began preaching his faith in their performance, and they've continued to play hard--if not always well--in the wake of Jefferson's injury. But the Laker loss left him open to second-guessing, and coming from yours truly, the particulars here are pretty ironic.

As one who has seen the voodoo needlepoint men in an effort to concoct a curse on smallball, it pains me to note that Mac developed a fondness for that big lug Jason Collins that was a tad too lasting in tonight's second half, consigning the rook Kevin Love to the pine. I get the instinct: Love has been undressed in the paint most every game since Jefferson went down (see the defensive stats in the previous point in this trey), and Pau Gasol, Lamar Odom and Kobe were all drawing lots to see who should be granted the privilege of posting their man (respectively, Love, Gomes and Foye) up next. The Lakers shot 62.5% in the first half, and it would have been closer to 80% if folks like Derek Fisher and Jordan Farmar didn't decide a wide open midrange with more than 15 seconds on the shot clock was a better bet that a bunny in the post a mere five seconds and one entry pass later. Gasol was lunching off the top of Love's head, Odom was too quick and tall for Gomes, and Kobe posting Foye was elemental. Between the three of them, they were 19-26 FG in the first two periods.

But, ah, Collins wasn't helping. In fact Collins was minus -9 in 13:03 first half minutes, versus Love's plus +5 in 10:57. And when Love played the first 11:12 of the third period, he was plus +4. Yet he never found his way back on to the court: Collins went the final 12:48 and was minus -3. Working the abacus, that amounts to Love at a team-best plus +9 for 22:07 and Collins a team-worst minus -12 at 25:53. After the game, McHale cited Love's foul trouble for some of the limited burn (and as a rook he got screwed on at least two plays, a back-to-back hack by Odom on a shot and then a missed charge that was instead whistled a blocking foul on him late in the third), and praised Collins' low-post defense. True enough, Collins showed more of a pulse that the flabby effort he'd been clocking recently. But at the very least in the seesaw stages of crunchtime, when teams were shooting a lot of free throws, McHale could have substituted offense/defense with Love and Collins.

Criticism #2 is the curious DNP-Coach's Decision adjoining Brian Cardinal's name in the Wolves-Lakers box score. Of all the players who have stepped up in value since Jefferson's injury, Cardinal is at the head of the line. In the three games since the All Star break prior to the Lakers tilt, the Wolves have been a whopping plus +30 in the 52 minutes Cardinal has been on the court; meaning they have been minus -38 in the 92 minutes he sat. This is in keeping with a season-long trend. Right now, the Wolves are averaging plus +6.0 points per 48 minutes when Cardinal is on the court. Bassy Telfair is second on the club with plus +0.9 points per 48 minutes, and no other Timberwolf is in positive territory.

Cardinal does this with the basics. On offense, he moves the ball and then moves his feet. On defense, he keeps his head on a swivel, his brain active with the Wolves' schemes on rotations, his mouth moving to communicate, and his feet churning. Then there is the little rubber billy club he keeps in his shorts, and brings out to flatten his opponents whenever they become too impudent in the paint. At least I think that's why bodies (including Cardinal's) typically go flying and the opponents eyes open a little wider when  Cardinal is in the game. It would have been nice to see what Cardinal might have done against Lamar Odom, who typically tortures the Wolves and who is widely renowned to be less than enamored with rugged contact underneath the hoop. From a talent and ability standpoint, Gomes is a much better option versus Odom. But Ryan Gomes is also a nice guy--just the way Odom likes the men matched up with him to be.

Finally, and most defensibly for McHale, was his decision to bench Rodney Carney after Carney had shown flashes of his January coming-out party, which was replete with deadly treys, breakout layups in transition, and hounddog defense. The back-to-back blocks Carney put on Tevor Ariza and then Kobe in the 4th quarter demonstrated that the pogo sticks in his hamstrings were singing from fine tuning. That McHale would want Foye, his clutch crunchtime shooter, in for the last 3:40 of a back-and-forth game is perfectly understandable. But it might have been nice to keep Carney going and sit Mike Miller, enabling Carney to stay on Kobe, with Foye switching over to Luke Walton. Yes, Walton would have a huge height advantage, but he's no taller than Peja Stokjokavic or Danny Granger, a pair of forwards that have been surprised by Foye's rejection of their shots in recent weeks. And not guarding Kobe could have enabled Foye to concentrate his energies on offense, where his last-possession trey fell about two-feet short as the Wolves went for a tie at the buzzer.

3. Telfair The Shooter: How Much Confidence is Too Much?

Remember most of last season and the early part of this one, when Wolves' opponents dared Telfair to shoot? Remember how wisely reluctant he was to comply? No more. When Telfair erupted for a team-high 30 points in the win over Miami, it was the pinnacle of a steady pattern that has seen Bassy be more and more willing to not only take what the D is offering him, but forcing the action and turning himself into one of the team's go-to shooters.

Well, the game after the Miami breakout, Telfair shot 1-9 FG in the loss to the Pacers. Undeterred, he had a team-tied high 17 FGA (and a team-tying 9 FG) versus LA. When I asked McHale if he was comfortable with Bassy launching 17 shots, the coach replied that if they were good shots, he had no problem with it. Then he explicitly said, "and Bassy had 17 good shots tonight." A few minutes later in the locker room, Telfair pronounced himself more confident in his shot than ever before and pointedly noted that guys needed to step up on offense in Jefferson's absence.

So, let's take a reality check. For the season, Telfair is shooting 35.2%. Over the course of his 4 and a half years in the NBA, his career accuracy is a hair over 39%. As a team the Wolves are shooting 44%. Even from three point range, Bassy's 34% from behind the arc is behind the team's composite accuracy of 34.4%. What makes this especially maddening is that Bassy can keep the basketball on a string like no other Timberwolf. On Sunday he crossed over to his left hand and then zipped a pass half the distance of the court, a la Steve Nash, to a teammate just outside the three-point arc for a hopeful heave at the halftime buzzer. A slo-mo of some of his dribble moves seems a mixture of hip hop, ballet, and computer graphics. Just make sure you stop the tape before he goes up to shoot.

Maybe someday we'll discover who put the silver helmets over the heads of Telfair and Miller, flipped a switch, and exchanged their personalities. Miller, who by all indications fancies himself as a point guard in a plodding 6-8 body, has shot 27-52 FG over the last six games, with 34 assists and 21 turnovers. During that same period, Telfair is shooting 32-73 FG with 31 assists and 10 turnovers. Hey here's an idea: How about if the guy with the career 46% FG (47.7% this year) shoots a little more often instead of executing snazzy turnovers while the guy with the team's best assist-to-turnover ratio drops a few more dimes instead of blowing jumpers? Then, just maybe, the Wolves wouldn't rank near the bottom of the NBA in FG efficiency.

Last but not least, among those 17 "good shots" Telfair attempted on Sunday, not one was a free throw.