It’s October, arguably the best sports month of the year, and all of the Twin Cities’ major sports teams are active. The Minnesota Timberwolves got back in the swing of the basketball season with two early preseason games in Abu Dhabi against the Dallas Mavericks. As you may already know, the Wolves came out of the gates hot and won both games. Still, it’s the preseason, and the wins don’t count toward anything but perhaps good vibes. However, it’s important to parse through some of the garbage time minutes to see what we can take away from these games. What did we learn the Wolves that we will see most nights in the regular season battling for wins?
The Wolves led after both first halves
As with most preseason games, in the second half of each game, the Wolves and the Mavericks rested their starters. The second halves offered some valuable tape on which bench players have been progressing over the offseason, and which players may move up the rotation ladder as the season progresses. However, they didn’t offer much in terms of what the Wolves will look like nightly.
However, the Wolves rested Anthony Edwards in Game 1, and Jaden McDaniels in Game 2, and led going into halftime in both games when the starters were in. The offense was humming in both games, and the ball movement looked natural. Most offensive possessions started with some sort of play or action to get the team moving, and there were fewer sticky hero ball possessions.
The Mavs ended last season with a similar record to the Wolves, so their head to head matchups during the upcoming season will likely be very important once again in determining the team’s seedings in the playoff race. Kyrie Irving didn’t play in the second game, but it was good to see the Wolves starters seem to have an edge in the matchup. While we can be fairly certain that this is what Minnesota’s rotations will look like throughout the year, it’s hard to say the same about Dallas.
They started two rookies, Dereck Lively and Olivier-Maxence Prosper, in the preseason. That seems a bit odd, given that they are constructed to be a win-now team with Luka Doncic and Kyrie. Still, they don’t exactly have amazing options behind their rookies to start aside from Josh Green. That could mean that the Mavs make some moves early on in the season. They may have a significantly different roster, or at the very least different rotations, by the trade deadline.
KAT looks fresh
Karl-Anthony Towns had a tough 2022-23 season. A throat infection held him out of training camp, and a calf injury kept him out of much of the regular season. However, in the first two preseason games, KAT looked like his old self. Towns came out of the gates aggressive in Game 1, and nailed a deep three from the top of the arc on the first possession of the game. He also seemed to be focusing on driving into the paint in transition and the half-court. That was excellent to see because that was a big part of Karl’s offensive game in his stellar 2021-22 season when he made All-NBA.
KAT also seemed to bring some of the confidence and energy he brought to the Dominican Republic national team this summer to the Wolves. He was the primary engine of the offense in Game 1. Towns was decisive in choosing to drive or shoot, and he scored 20 points in 17 minutes. The Mavericks didn’t have any defenders who could properly battle KAT in the paint. Karl also looked good defensively, blocking two shots in the first game and one shot in the second, while also grabbing two steals.
The spacing looked better
KAT generally started offensive possessions on the perimeter when he and Rudy Gobert were playing at the same time, but he didn’t just stay there for the most part. Often he would be involved in initial actions with Mike Conley or one of the other guards, which would often open up opportunities for lanes into the paint, or space for KAT on the perimeter. If the play began to break down, and the shot clock got low, Karl would often improvise and find a way to get into the paint to be available for a dump-off.
It was also nice to see that the two big lineups didn’t prevent KAT from driving into the lane, and occasionally he and Rudy made space for each other. On one play when KAT was driving down the lane with the ball, Rudy saw him coming and boxed out the Mavericks center Dereck Lively outside of the paint so he couldn’t contest Karl’s dunk.
Ant flexed some new moves
Though Ant only played in the first half of the second preseason game, that was still enough time for him to make a few highlight plays that showed some of the things he’s worked on during the offseason and in the FIBA games.
Possibly his most impressive play came at the end of the first quarter on a buzzer beater. Ant is in single coverage on the perimeter, he gets the defender off-balance a bit, then drives into the lane while he’s got extra space. A second defender collapses to help when he gets into the paint, Ant sees that the lane is closed off, stops his momentum, then does a 180 spin into a fadeaway midrange jumper and nails it with the extra space he’s created for himself from the move. Truly some next level stuff that only a few people in the NBA can do.
The bench held its own
Despite sitting the starters with the lead at halftime of both games, Minnesota’s bench was still able to close out the game against Dallas’s reserves. There’s a feeling that this could be one of the deepest Wolves teams in franchise history, and these games lend credence to that. Minnesota’s backup bigs, Naz Reid and Luka Garza, know how to use their size to take advantage of mismatches and have the offensive skills to score on most reserve bigs with ease.
Garza may not see the floor a ton this year given his spot on the depth chart, still in his media day interview he mentioned working on his body during the summer with the goal of getting slimmer and quicker so he can more capably play the 4, and it shows. I’m not usually one for preseason muscle watch, but he looks so slim that I didn’t recognize him and thought he was a new wing on the team for a moment when he first checked into the game, which makes sense because he said he went from 11-12% body fat down to 6.6% over the summer. He seems to be transforming his body in similar ways that Naz did early in his career.
Nickeil Alexander-Walker seems to be carrying over his impressive performances from the playoffs last season with the Wolves, and in FIBA with Team Canada, into this new season. Alexander-Walker has shot incredibly well since earning his way into the Wolves rotation, and seems to be a perfect complimentary player to their lead guards in Ant and Mike Conley. Nickeil can defend the point of attack, score in limited usage, and organize the offense when it’s required of him, allowing him to fill different gaps in the lineup depending on what rotations he’s in. We saw Nickeil start in place of Ant in the first preseason game and Jaden in the second. He looked completely at home in the role, while helping the Wolves earn a big leads early in both games.
