The Minnesota Timberwolves defeated the Denver Nuggets 111-108 on Sunday night.
Trailing 100-91, the Wolves buckled down on the defensive end and received some timely shooting from Karl-Anthony and Andrew Wiggins to pull ahead late in fourth quarter. Wiggins knocked down a three to tie the contest at 106, and then Towns knocked down a 21-footer (shown below) that put them up two with just over 40 seconds left to play. Shockingly enough, the narrow margin was all Tom Thibodeau’s club would need to seal just its second victory over a Pacific division opponent this season.
Shockingly enough, the narrow margin was all Tom Thibodeau’s club would need to seal just its second victory over a Pacific division opponent this season.
“We didn’t play particularly well,” Thibodeau admitted postgame, adding, “but I liked the way we played down the stretch in the fourth quarter.”
“The past couple games the fourth quarter has been very good. We had a lot of guys step up; I thought the way Kris started the game was huge, and then of course Tyus down the stretch also, and then Tyus and Kris playing together really well and Karl was really very strong throughout.”
Starting in lieu of Ricky Rubio, who missed Sunday’s contest to attend his grandmother’s funeral, Kris Dunn tallied 10 points, nine assists and eight rebounds en route to a team-high plus-minus of positive-14. And his effort at the defensive end helped change the tide during the final minutes.
“Get stops,” Dunn said, explaining what the team’s mindset had been during the final minutes. “The whole game, we were just trading buckets with the other team. Just try to get stops. We knew if we could get stops, we could keep getting scores and try to cut the lead down.”
Shabazz Muhammad contributed 20 points off-the-bench on 9-of-14 shooting. Like Dunn, Muhammad spoke of the importance defense had in Sunday’s victory after the game.
“I think we’re really starting to learn,” Muhammad said. “Especially in the last minute, we just made some really nice defensive stops. We’re really doing it at that end even though all game we couldn’t really lock down, we got the stops we needed and it really helped us out a lot.”
It was Karl-Anthony Towns who carried the load offensively, scoring 32 points on 13-of-19 shooting to go with his 12 rebounds, seven assists and four blocks.
“He’s playing out of his mind right now,” Andrew Wiggins said of Towns.
“Rebounding, scoring, defending, everything — there’s nothing he’s not doing.”
