The Atlanta Hawks aren't the Lakers, Clippers, Bucks or any other team that is billed as a title contender this season.
They are a young team currently going through their own struggles in finding an identity, and still they made the Timberwolves look like they didn't belong on the same floor in a 116-98 demolition at Target Center on Friday night.
The Wolves always knew if they missed Karl-Anthony Towns for any amount of time they would be flailing to get wins.
But for most of this season they've looked helpless, especially on nights like Friday.
The Wolves have a young roster by design from President Gersson Rosas, but nights like Friday make it hard for fans to see the vision, of what this team could be with more experience and more consistency when there were few glimmers of anything positive, especially when the game wasn't already well in hand for Atlanta — and especially among a fanbase that has seen its share of front offices come and go without much success.
The Wolves are 1-9 when they play without Towns. Ten games is not an insignificant amount of time. This season, it represents nearly 14% of all games the Wolves will play. It's hard to see how this Wolves team has gotten significantly better from the first blowout at the hands of the Lakers without Towns to Friday night in that stretch of games.
There are still defensive mistakes that shouldn't be happening, like when the Wolves, after a made free throw, allowed Atlanta's Trae Young to go the length of the floor for a layup with 28.3 seconds left in the second quarter to set up a two-for-one.
Or when they let Young, who scored 43, go the length of the floor after a thunderous Naz Reid dunk in the third quarter.
Their best player without Towns, D'Angelo Russell had just nine points on 2 of 9 shooting as he got to rest for the fourth quarter in another blowout. Malik Beasley led the Wolves with 17 while Ricky Rubio had four points as he returned from the COVID protocol. Clint Capela had quite the night in getting a triple-double by way of blocked shots. He had 13 points, 19 rebounds and 10 blocks, tying a Target Center record for blocks.
The Wolves held their own through the first quarter and were only down 25-19, but the Hawks, who committed 26 turnovers, weren't as sloppy Friday, and that meant doom for the outmatched Wolves in the second quarter.
Missed shots led to defensive issues, which compounded more mistakes on both ends as the Wolves fell behind by as much as 23 in the second quarter. They shot just 16-for-45 in the first half.
The Wolves started the quarter with a lineup that featured little shooting with Rubio, Ed Davis, Jarrett Culver, Jaden McDaniels and Anthony Edwards — and it showed. The Wolves had just two points in the first three minutes of the second quarter and just nine points over the first 7 minutes, 19 seconds of the quarter. They would start hitting some shots the rest of the half but Atlanta wasn't slowing down on the offensive end. Young had 25 points by halftime. Capela had eight points, 15 rebounds and six blocks.
The closest the Wolves got in the third quarter was 14 when they cut it to 73-59, but Atlanta immediately went on a 14-2 run that squashed any hope of the Wolves making an NBA-style 20-plus-point comeback.
Then as he's done for several games already this season coach Ryan Saunders mostly let the reserves play in the fourth quarter while the only bit of suspense was if Capela would get his triple double. Capela got there, and the empty Target Center filled with cheering.
At least somebody was happy.
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January 23, 2021 at 10:21AM
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Timberwolves continue to struggle, lose 116-98 to Atlanta - Minneapolis Star Tribune
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