You don’t replace a player like Zach individually; we do it collectively. It’s our group. We feel that we have more than enough to win with.
— Thibodeau hours after learning of LaVine’s season-ending injury
It’s easy to make an argument for why the Minnesota Timberwolves should tank it after their 107-99 loss to the Memphis Grizzlies. They had just learned that one of their three young stars, Zach LaVine, would miss the rest of the season with an ACL tear. Brandon Rush, the player who will replace most of his minutes, went 1-3 from three-point range and finished with five points and a minus-17 rating. And the team is now 9-5 (.600) in games in which they’ve held a 15-point lead — the average NBA team wins 90 percent of the time when holding a 15-point lead.
“I thought we started the game well, the second quarter was a problem,” said Wolves coach and president of basketball operations Tom Thibodeau, alluding to the 31-15 lead Minnesota blew in the second quarter. “Came back into the third, then couldn’t close it out.”
At 19-32, Minnesota now sits at No. 13 in the Western Conference. The Denver Nuggets (22-28) occupy the eighth and final playoff seed as of Sunday morning; the Portland Trail Blazers (22-29) sit right behind them. On the other hand, only the 17-36 Los Angeles Lakers and 16-35 Phoenix Suns trail the Wolves in the West. They could bottom out and try to get another top pick, pairing him with Karl-Anthony Towns, Andrew Wiggins, Kris Dunn and the now-injured Zach LaVine to try and create a young starting five. On the other hand, they could go for the eighth seed, which is very much in reach, and bring playoff basketball back to Minneapolis for the first time since 2004.
A playoff series against the Golden State Warriors will likely end in a four-game sweep, but it should fill the Target Center once again
The former argument is pretty straightforward: young talent is the most valuable asset in the NBA and the building blocks upon which many championships are built. The latter is a bit more complicated. A playoff series against the Golden State Warriors will likely end in a four-game sweep, but it should fill the Target Center once again, creating energy and excitement that should translate into higher fan engagement and attendance in the seasons to come. After all, a playoff appearance means the Wolves are no longer just selling hope; they’re offering some tangible results, albeit nowhere close to a championship-caliber product.
The Wolves are well-positioned to continue winning after LaVine’s injury. While he has been one of the team’s go-to scorers when healthy, Towns and Wiggins are capable of picking up some of that slack. Furthermore, a narrative was forming that Wiggins and LaVine may be redundant — volume-scoring forwards — and, at the very least, Wiggins has always been the finisher in crunch time.
As for the rest of the supporting cast, LaVine has been an energy player for the Wolves this year by using his, at times, irrational confidence to hit important, improbable shots to get the team back into games. Shabazz Muhammad, a slasher who is in a contract year and has a knack for hitting open threes and getting to the basket, can provide a change of pace off the bench. And Brandon Rush, a 31-year-old, nine-year veteran who played with Golden State last year, is a three-point specialist who spaces the court well and does the little things like closing in on defenders better than many of the less experienced players on the team.
“Brandon’s done a great job of staying ready. He’s put a lot of work in, a lot of extra work, so we’ll start there,” said Thibodeau before the Memphis game. “The thing for us, the defense is even more important, the rebounding is more important — all those things. If we do those things, we can be in position to win.”
“I feel pretty comfortable stepping in, filling that void for Zach,” said Rush. “I work every single day on my conditioning, on my on-the-court stuff, so I just prepare myself for a role like this whenever that opportunity knocks.”
Rush is a good complement to LaVine off the court as well. He’s been through two knee injuries and understands the work that goes into rehabilitation and getting back on the court. While LaVine, one of the team’s hardest working players, is expected to make a full-fledged effort to recover from his injury, having a player who has been through it before and can speak to the nuances of rehab and getting back into playing shape is valuable.
“I feel for him big time, just because I’ve been through the same thing twice,” said Rush. “It took a while. It took me a good two years, but he had just a straight ACL; I tore pretty much everything in my knee, so it took me a while. But Zach is a freak athlete, so he’ll be back soon.”
Ricky Rubio tore his ACL defending Kobe Bryant during his rookie year, and Thibodeau was coaching the Chicago Bulls when Derrick Rose went through his injury. In addition to the medical staff, having multiple people to offer insight into the various stages of recovery and when the right time to come back is should benefit LaVine. He’ll need people to tell him not to rush back, what to do if he feels a certain kind of pain or how to handle it mentally.
“I’m gonna ask him where his head’s at, because man, when that happened to me, my head was all over the place, like: ‘When am I gonna be back? Am I gonna be the same?’” said Rush, who had not spoken to LaVine before the Memphis game, wanting to give him his space right after the news broke. “I’m just gonna ask him where his head’s at right now, and just try to offer him some insight on the things I had to do to get right.”
The news was especially distressing for Towns, who, like Wiggins, has grown especially close to LaVine during their time as teammates. “I called him all morning, I woke up early and tried to make sure he was okay,” said Towns before the Memphis game. “I got the news and it was upsetting. You cry for him. That’s not just my teammate, that’s my brother and one of my best friends. For him to have to go through that, it hurts me a lot. I’m just wishing him a speedy recovery. If he needs anything, he knows my number. He won’t hesitate to call me for anything.”
With a support system in place on and off the court, the team should be able to tread water and reach the eighth seed without LaVine — and play in front of larger crowds when he comes back next season. The Wolves were always an imperfect team, even with him, but they should be just good enough to make the playoffs this year.
“Each injury is different, so the important thing is for us to continue to support Zach, once he’s able to be around the team, as much as possible,” said Thibodeau. “And for the team, for us to continue to improve, concentrate on what we have to do to win.”
