Timberwolves

With the Tanking Teams Coming to Town, Timberwolves Look to Pounce

(photo credit: Jim Faklis)

This week is the Timberwolves chance to all but solidify their spot as a Western Conference playoff team.

While a three-game win streak won’t mathematically clinch anything, it will get them to 45 wins in a Western Conference where something around 47 or so feels like a “magic number”.

And whether it’s the work of wizards or just dumb luck, the Timberwolves have three of the worst teams in the NBA filling out their upcoming week.

The Memphis Grizzlies, Atlanta Hawks and Dallas Mavericks have three of the five worst records in the NBA, and are desperately trying to keep it that way.

The Grizzlies — who have one win since Jan. 29 — don’t play Marc Gasol on the second end of back-to-backs and are without Mike Conley, the Hawks — who have two wins in March — are without Dennis Schroeder and the Mavericks are just trying to get rookie Dennis Smith Jr. into his own.

Players on the floor never attempt to lose, but the teams themselves aren’t interested in winning at this point. The Timberwolves need to take advantage of that.

And when comparing schedules with the rest of the Western Conference playoff hopefuls, a road to a decent playoff spot appears possible — even likely.

But the Timberwolves have proven that all NBA teams can win a game on any given night. They’ve already lost to two of the teams they’re matched up against this week — Memphis and Atlanta — and can’t let these games slide away.

“We can’t just hope for people to lose,” Andrew Wiggins said at Monday morning shootaround, prior to their matchup with the Memphis Grizzlies. “We have to put matters into our own hands and try to win every game we can.”

The difference between those games and this week could end up being the time of the season. When the Timberwolves lost to Memphis in December, the Grizzlies still believed they could salvage a decent year. They were 8-15 at the time, but were getting surprisingly good contribution from Tyreke Evans, and Marc Gasol was as active as ever.

Their loss to Atlanta in late January was a bit more peculiar, though. It was right on the tail end of their best stretch of the season, but nothing clicked that night.

But while the season was all but over for the Hawks in late January, true “tanking” doesn’t really start until late February.

But even using Jan. 29 as a marking point — the last win the Grizzlies had before they’d go on to lose 23 of 24 — it’s pretty telling how bad they’ve gotten.

If you need more evidence, look no further than last week’s 61-point loss to the sub-.500 Charlotte Hornets.

All three teams are in the bottom seven in both offensive and defensive rating since that date, and none have even reached 8 wins in that time frame. For reference, the Timberwolves only have 10 wins in that stretch, but most of it was without Jimmy Butler and have the fewest number of games over that stretch.

These are games that, by all accounts, the Timberwolves should win. It’s rare to say that one NBA team has a truly overwhelming “this team cannot lose this game” advantage over another at the beginning of the season — unless you’re talking about a healthy Golden State or Houston, perhaps.

All teams have something to play for when the season begins, and all teams have NBA-quality talent. And as the schedule for the Wolves (and other teams) has proven, the worst teams in the league can beat playoff teams.

But in late March, when playoff hopefuls collide with teams that want Luka Doncic and Marvin Bagley on their team, true destruction can take place. The Wolves would be wise to try to take advantage of that.

Their chance at a playoff spot isn’t clinched yet. But this is the perfect way to get there.


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