It’s been a long time.
Sunday’s blowout win over the Charlotte Hornets provided the Timberwolves a chance to say a few things they haven’t been able to say in years. They’re four games over .500 for the first time since 2007. They’ve won five straight games; the first time that’s happened since 2009. Their 7-3 record is the best 10-game start the franchise has had since the start of the 2001-02 season. It’s been mostly success for the Timberwolves the past week and change, unfamiliar territory for any Minnesotan born after 2000.
The reaction from the players? Jimmy Butler, speaking to FS North’s Marney Gellner at center court after the game, kept his answer short.
“Let’s try to go for six.”
He continued his thoughts in the locker room.
“Who doesn’t want to win?” Butler said, describing what winning means to the Timberwolves fan base. “Who doesn’t want to be part of a winning city or a winning organization? But we have to keep playing really good basketball.”
It was a mostly quiet night for Butler, who again deferred to the other starters to contribute the major punch of the offense. Andrew Wiggins had a consistent scoring night, all while making good decisions on when to shoot and when to pass. Karl-Anthony Towns had a low-numbers game by his typical standards, but did a good job dealing with Dwight Howard on both ends. The game’s biggest star, however, wasn’t one of the often-touted members of the “Big Three”.
Jeff Teague effectively put the game away for his team in the first half. A pair of pull-up 3-pointers, followed immediately by an assisted 3-pointer, brought the Wolves’ lead up from five to 11. From then on, the Hornets never got the game back below single digits.
“Thibs always preaches to me to shoot more 3’s,” Teague said. “That’s my preferred shot; the transition pull-up, or whatever. I just try to be confident and knock it down.”
The bench did their part, too. Not a single player on the 13-man active roster – all of whom played – finished with a negative plus-minus figure. Jamal Crawford and Gorgui Dieng each had big nights off the pine, and Nemanja Bjelica had a low-usage-but-efficient night of his own.
The last two wins, both played over the weekend, were blowout victories. Adding that to the previous three wins, close affairs won with a lot more grit and late-game heroics, it could be easy for a team to find its way back into complacency. Especially with young central pieces like Towns and Wiggins, focusing on the things this team is doing right, and building on that, is the team’s central message going forward.
“We have to put the work into this. We want to keep getting better all season long,” head coach Tom Thibodeau said at the post-game press conference. “If you start taking shortcuts, the results aren’t going to be good. Obviously, there’s a lot of work to be done.”
The games won’t get any easier from here, either. Saturday’s win was against a one-win Dallas team, and Charlotte was without two win starters on Sunday. Three of their next four games are against playoff teams, two of whom – Golden State and San Antonio – are expected to finish in the top four in the Western Conference.
Going forward, Thibodeau and his Wolves will want to continue finding ways to make a new history. To this point, it won’t be terribly hard to match and eclipse the history they’re facing, but it should be what they go after as the season presses on. It’s been a while since fans in the Twin Cities have seen a successful Timberwolves team, even this late in the season, and they don’t want it to disappear now.
They want the new records to start with this season’s early success. So far, it’s working.
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