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_{Photo copyright 2009 NBAE (Photo by David Sherman/NBAE via Getty Images)}

Game #56, Road Game #29: Toronto 118, Minnesota 110

Game #57, Home Game #28: Minnesota 103, Utah 120

Season Record: 17-40

1. Worn Down, Then Out

Sometimes basketball can be explained in pretty simple terms, and so it is with the Timberwolves since Al Jefferson went down. Knowing he doesn't have a reliable low post option on the order of "Big Al," coach Kevin McHale has gone to a motion offense, with a lot of cuts and screens and circular movement in the half-court, plus the desire and mandate to push the pace in transition whenever possible. Gone are the possessions--which occurred anywhere from a quarter to two-thirds of the time--where Minnesota could deliver the entry pass to Jefferson on the block and then execute minimal movement as he made something happen in the paint. Sure, sometimes he would rifle it back out to the perimeter off the double team, but even that didn't require a lot of planning, as Jefferson's passing skills remains a mere step above rudimentary. He was actually more likely to feed you when you were standing on the wing than if you cut hard to the hoop.

The Wolves have become very adept at this slick passing, constant motion scheme. When they are functioning smoothly, which occurs for at least two or three times at 3-4 minutes per stretch recently, it is a joy to watch. The players are generally selfless, aggressive and energetic. Woefully undersized against most every opponent they encounter, they thrive on speed and execution.

But this is a taxing way to operate, especially compared to the nights of Jefferson. The inevitable fatigue manifests itself in mental mistakes at both ends of the court, and in the perserverence, alertness and desire to make stops on defense at crunchtime. Relative to most opponents. the current Wolves roster lacks size, depth and experience, and every one of those things preys on their lungs, legs and willpower as they literally wear down and then wear out.

The numbers are pretty stark in this regard. Since Jefferson went down with his knee injury versus New Orleans earlier this month, the Wolves have yielded at least 31 points in the 4th quarter in 6 of their seven games, and in those same six games it has been the most points the opponent has scored in any quarter of the game. (BTW, the exception is not their lone win, over Miami, but the loss to Indiana, where they yielded "just" 26 in the 4th and still lost by 5.)

In other words, the Wolves have learned how to play without Jefferson; they just haven't been able to sustain it. And judging by the past two losses, on the road in Toronto Tuesday and at home versus Utah Wednesday, this trend is getting worse, not better.

As happened against the Lakers last Sunday, McHale hastened the Toronto loss by sitting Kevin Love in the 4th quarter and going with an impossibly small lineup of Gomes-Miller-Telfair-Foye-Carney. Yes, the Raptors likewise had gone small, but Bargnani, Bosh and Marion were the frontline the final 2:38 and at least two of them were always on the court in the final quarter. The irony is that McHale is now regarding the position Love plays on the court exactly the way he regarded Jefferson's: The rook is constantly a center, and almost never a power forward playing next to a legit big.

Love was dominant to open the game Tuesday, scoring six of the team's first eight points and half of their first 22 with just 5:41 gone in the game. Over the next 42:19, he would score just 4 more, in part because he played only 15:02 of that span. But the Wolves were working their ball-movement game to near-perfection, going off for 37 in the first period on a whopping 10 assists while shooting 60% from the field. They scored 8 more quick points in the first 2:17 of the second, but by then Minnesota was utilizing its bench, which was fairly ineffective except for Brian Cardinal, who physically annoyed Bosh right out of his rhythm (oh if Cardinal could have only played Odom in the loss to the Lakers on Sunday); but Cardinal was first off the bench and thus the first to sit. The ball movement was retarded considerably with the scrubs, especially without either Telfair or Miller in the game. You can't blame McHale for resting his regulars at some point, but because Miller refuses to play any position but demi-point guard--and because for the past two games he's been really good at it--it might be wise to make him your de facto backup point and put him beside Foye or Ollie.

Anyway, there was too much quick jacking later in the second, enabling the Raptors to make it a game after being down 16 early in the period. From there, that lack of size-depth-experience troika doomed Minnesota, as did the heavy minutes endured by Miller and Gomes--both superb at the ball movement scheme but both heavy afoot and not up to the defensive challenge at crunchtime. Toronto scored 34 and won going away.

I can't remember--ever--an entire quintet of Timberwolves moving without the ball any better than the starters did in the first half against Utah. Randy Foye--the hero of the January surge and the remaining cornerstone with Jefferson out--was the fifth best player on the floor for Minnesota. Miller, who had nine assists and zero turnovers against Toronto but still frequently set up his teammates (especially Telfair) to fail at a rate higher than if he'd taken the shot himself, finally blended sharp passing with smart shot selection, hitting all six of his first half FGA. Perhaps he's more comfortable going for his when he knows (o thinks) all of his teammates are sufficiently involved, because he turned down some dime temptations he almost always seizes. Meanwhile, Gomes continued to be aggressive toward the hoop, and Telfair wasn't short-circuiting the offense by shooting.

Perhaps even more impressively, the Wolves were exerting the effort on defense, heeding McHale plaint from the previous night in Toronto. Their feet were moving and their necks were swiveling to counter Utah's steady diet of nifty back cuts and crunching picks, and everyone's hand were active with deflections and bothers if not steals. It was a very pleasurable 24 minutes of hoops, far superior to the also pleasurable effort against the Lakers because the Jazz weren't coasting like LA; on the contrary, with Boozer, Williams and Kirilenko all finally healthy at the same time, they'd won five in a row and need to stay hot to secure a playoff berth.

But even with the Wolves up by 4 at halftime (55-51), there were troubling signs. Love and Miller were a combined 13-14 FG for the half--Love had 17 points, 10 rebounds and was plus +20 in 17:35 of action--but Minnesota was getting absolutely nothing from their bench, who shot a collective 1-8 FG. Meanwhile, Deron Williams and Paul Millsap were a combined 1-13 FG for Utah, and seemed a much better bet to spring back from this shooting slump than the Wolves' bench.

No criticism of McHale for this substitution rotation. He had his starters relatively rested and inserted into the game with 8:27 to play and Minnesota down just 3, 89-92. But "rested" is a relative term. Utah is a notoriously physical team, one that usually leads the NBA in fouls committed; a squad that will run you through more picks than most opponents, and cause you to be constantly mentally alert for the quick back-screens and cuts to the basket. As crunchtime unfolded, Minnesota was clearly gassed again. After posting a 17/9 assist/turnover ratio in the first three periods, they went 4/5 in the 4th, and shot 35.3% (6-17 FG) after going 49.2% (32-65 FG) through the first three quarters. Meanwhile, the Jazz were hitting 61.1% of their shots (11-18 FG) in the period while getting to the line 15 times (and sinking 13) off of 10 fouls by the tired Timberwolves.

After the game, I asked McHale the obvious: Without Jefferson to feed in the low block for points that don't require such intensive effort, could it be that your team just doesn't have the size and depth to last, and you eventually wear out? I don't know, he replied, but of course he knew. We can't make excuses, he emphasized, and that is really the nub of it. No matter how legitimate, if the Wolves begin to think they can't sustain their pace and grit against good teams, it will be a self-fulfilling prophecy. The other question I asked him is if he can do anything about apportioning shot selection. Specifically, Miller and Love combined for a ridiculously productive 19-23 FG from the field, yet Miller once again had the fewest FGA of any of the starters (9-11 FGA) and Love only attempted one more than that (10-12 FGA). He replied that the team does run plays for both Miller and Love but that sometimes those options are taken away and it is time to check down to plan B or C. But in any case, McHale emphasized, the team is going to move the ball and move their feet, and when the man is open in this fast-paced scheme, he should be taking the shot. I think he concluded by saying, that if the team stood around and pounded it in to one or two guys (a la w/Jefferson), they'd be "dead."

2. Appreciating Gomes

Why the Boston Celtics didn't make a hard run at Ryan Gomes this off-season remains a mystery. The Celts could have offered Gomes (then a restricted free agent) a million or two less than James Posey got in New Orleans and it would have exceeded what the Wolves wound up paying. Perhaps Minnesota would have matched, but the greater point is that Gomes would have given Boston just what it needed--which is multipurpose glue in a large swingman.

The style and caliber of his play since Jefferson went down is a good example. With Big Al in the lineup, Gomes reached the 20-point mark a mere 5 times in the team's first 50 games. Now that Jefferson is out, Gomes has gone for more than 20 five straight times. Called upon to guard power forwards instead of small forward, his defense has slipped a tad, but certainly not the effort. And while he is jacking up more shots, they remain so much in the flow of the offense, and are so consistent both in their frequency and their relative accuracy, that he continues to operate beneath the radar. He is a professional.

He is also magnanimously personable. Whereas the vast majority of NBA players will respond to detailed and substantial questions from the media by saying they don't know or giving a monosyllibic reply, simply to get rid of you, Gomes will engage. After Wednesday's game, I said I knew the company line was that the Wolves couldn't make excuses for their lack of perseverance, especially on defense (three players echoed McHale on that point) , but wasn't it tougher to keep your stamina without the load lightening Jefferson provided? He acknowledged that it was, especially against a team like the Jazz, who have so many weapons and so many contingenies out of Jerry Sloan's basic sets. "We'd try to take something away that they'd done and they'd do something else" in the context of that same play, he explained. it was particularly difficult "to play good defense for 22 seconds" and then get a breakdown right before the shot clock ended, or yield an offensive rebound. He added that pushing the pace also risks more turnovers, which can also seriously compromise the defense, in addition to the physical toll it takes.

I'd noticed he'd been pretty much splitting his defensive assignment between Carlos Boozer and Mehmet Okur and asked Gomes what the protocol was on assignments. He replied that some of it was staying with the man who had wound up guarding you at the other end and not "cross switching" (which some teams do more than others) in transition. When I said it was particularly hard guarding Okur, who can stick the trey but also fake it and then drive to the hoop, and if you close out he can whip it over the Kyle Korver, a deadly three point specialist who is becoming more and more like Richard Hamilton each succeeding year, he said that, at least when he was guarding a big on the perimeter, the capability of Deron Williams was also a big factor and helped both Okur and Boozer because their man was always aware of Williams' prowess on the pick and roll. It was just a quality conversation about hoops that most players don't have time to create.

Another noteworthy thing Gomes said was that when Jefferson comes back next year he is going to try and remember how aggressive he has been lately and continue that going forward in the future.

3. About That Trade...

Too much of the conventional wisdom after the recent trade with Sacramento was that the Wolves had helped themselves positionally at center and point guard for the remainder of the season. I'd always regarded Bobby Brown as a combo guard who was much closer to Foye than to Telfair in terms of his style and skill set. In two games of limited stints, Brown has shown he's not a point guard. His proclivity to shoot first and pass later contributed to the ball movement disruption that helped swing the game to Toronto on Tuesday.

Meanwhile, Shelden Williams hasn't gotten off the pine. When I asked McHale if he'd be ready soon, the coach responded that he doesn't like to play 11 guys, let alone 12, so exactly how much of a look-see we'll get of Williams remains ambiguous. There was a point late in the second quarter against Utah when there seemed to be a need for a defensive-oriented big who wasn't Collins' size, but McHale obviously thought otherwise.

Two things we are beginning to know, however: With some of the post-trade chatter, then the suiting up of Brown before Williams and now the playing of Brown before Williams, it would seem that Wolves are more intrigued with Brown, who, unlike Williams, has a year to go on his (small) contract. Secondly, McHale isn't really enamored with either player, which leads one to believe he wasn't the biggest influence in the room when the deal went down.