Minnesota Timberwolves: Gorgui Dieng’s three-point development
Minnesota Timberwolves center Gorgui Dieng has developed a three-point shot this season and has become one of the team’s most reliable shooters.
When the Minnesota Timberwolves traded Trey Burke to the Utah Jazz for Shabazz Muhammad and Gorgui Dieng on draft night in 2013, the Wolves knew they were getting a proven winner in Dieng and a player that would need to develop his shot to play in the modern NBA.
Dieng played three seasons at Louisville and won a National Championship in his last season there, but in those three years he attempted just three three-pointers and none came in his final season.
Each year the NBA has been trending towards a three-point-heavy league, and players that rarely shot from downtown are starting to get more shots up each season. Brook Lopez is a good example of this coming to fruition, as he didn’t start shooting threes until 2016 after entering the league in 2008.
Dieng received a massive contract following the 2016-17 season where he started in all 82 games and played fairly. At the time it looked like it wasn’t a bad deal for Minnesota, and he even took a pay cut to stay with the team that year.
The former Cardinal started to lose playing time when Taj Gibson came over to Minnesota the following season. Dieng’s contract became an issue when he started to lose playing time and confidence in his game.
With Ryan Saunders becoming the full-time head coach this season and instilling trust in a player that he has grown a bond with over the years, Dieng has started to play at a higher level. Despite the fact that he’s not averaging career high’s in points or rebounds, Deing is arguably having the best season of his career.
Dieng received a lot of his playing time when Karl-Anthony Towns was down with an injury, but his improved three-point shot has helped him stay in the rotation after KAT has returned to the lineup.
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Up until this season he rarely took shots from downtown, but now Dieng is doing so at a a successful clip.
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This season he’s shooting two more three-pointers per game and is hitting almost 40 percent of his attempts from downtown. However, the last two months are a more accurate representation of the strides he has made shooting the ball.
In the month of December, he attempted 3.1 threes per game hitting 34.9 percent of his attempts. It wasn’t until January 13th against the Los Angeles Clippers where he attempted more than two shots per game from distance.
The month of January has treated him well as he’s averaging 3.8 attempts per game and shooting an efficient 46.7 percent clip from deep.
Dieng’s ability to stretch the floor is going to be valuable to the team moving forward, and it will increase his trade value going into the trade deadline and his contract year next season if the team were to move on from him.
When Towns was out with an injury, the Timberwolves had the best defensive rating in the NBA. It may not have been directly correlated to Dieng taking KAT’s spot, but it does go to show that the former Cardinal played well on both sides of the ball during that span of time.
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Dieng’s three-point success has been impressive and something that wasn’t expected after watching him in college and his first few seasons in a Timberwolves uniform. But he’s developed into one of the more reliable shooters this team has, and his two-way ability has helped this team stay afloat while their All-Star center was out with an injury.