Karl-Anthony Towns is improving on offense, too

Timberwolves star Karl-Anthony Towns has made a well-chronicled step forward on the defensive end of the floor over the past few weeks, but he’s made major improvements on offense, too.

The Timberwolves defense continues to improve, earning the Wolves a top-six ranking over the past five-plus weeks, starting with their win over the Los Angeles Clippers on Dec. 6. But the Wolves offense actually ranks first in the entire NBA over that same span.

While Jimmy Butler has been otherworldly, don’t lose site of the fact that starting point guard Jeff Teague missed seven games right after Christmas and that Andrew Wiggins has continued to struggle to be a consistently efficient offensive contributor. While Karl-Anthony Towns’ defensive improvement has been lauded — and rightly so — it’s easy to lose site of just how far he’s come on offense, too.

Sure, his per-game numbers are down a tick, from 25.1 points and 12.3 rebounds per game to 20.2 and 12 so far in the 2017-18 campaign. His 3-point attempts and percentage are way up, and in turn his effective field goal percentage and true shooting percentage are up as well.

While his assist rate has actually decreased, it seems to be more a function of having the ball in his hands less. With Jimmy Butler in the fold, the Wolves are simply not calling as many plays that involve KAT receiving the ball in a position to make a play.

But lately, when Towns does get the ball and needs to make a split-second decision, he’s choosing the correct option more often than not. The old “the game is slowing down for him” cliché seems to be spot-on in this case.

Below, in a secondary fastbreak situation, Teague feeds Towns the ball in a tricky spot. While Towns has had some memorable dunks thus far in his career plays just like this, it’s always dangerous for big men to be handed the ball with a full head of steam and their sights set on the rim.

Here, however, Towns is able to stop on a dime and shovel a pass to Taj Gibson, who had set-up along the baseline and was rewarded with an easy dunk.

Not a fancy play by any means, but a great display of body control and quick-thinking by Towns to avoid crashing into Enes Kanter for what would have surely been an offensive foul.

Next, Towns throws a fairly dangerous pass that easily could have sailed out of bounds, but if you pause the video at the :02 mark, you’ll see that Towns could have shot an open 19-footer — not a bad move, either, as Towns shoots 48.9 percent on 2-pointers beyond 16 feet.

But KAT sees that Kristaps Porzingis is out of position and rifles a pass right at the rim that Gibson is able to come down with.

The below play is initiated by an awesome pass from Jamal Crawford in the pick-and-roll game. Towns has the defender on his hip but sees that Michael Beasley has left his man, Nemanja Bjelica, along the baseline to rotate over and step in front of the rim.

Towns probably has a left-handed layup that he would have been able to finish, but instead feeds the streaking Bjelly and logs the assist instead.

Again, it’s an example of Towns thinking quickly and computing where the defenders are relative to his teammates. Wolves fans may recall that dating back to his rookie season, Towns would often seem to be over-thinking his next move when receiving a pass. This led to double-clutch and off-balance contested jumpers, bad passes, and the occasional travel. But now, he’s thinking on his feet much more quickly and executing with a true crispness.

Now, let’s get to the two prettiest passes of the lot.

On Sunday night against Portland, KAT catches the ball at the top of the arc. With Gibson on the left elbow, Towns has a clear driving lane to his right hand. After one hard dribble, Al-Farouq Aminu had slid off of Taj to cut-off Towns’ drive. Towns delivered a bullet pass to Gibson in a tight window that snuck through and allowed Gibson to get the ball up to the rim before the third defender rotated down.

This was a perfect example of quick thinking. Aminu was surely looking to take a charge, and throwing the ball down to Gibson was the best play that Towns could have made.

Let’s end on one more play from the Knicks game: Towns’ memorable, over-the-head dime to Butler that drew the Wolves to within two points right before halftime of the Wolves’ win over New York last Friday night.

The pick-and-roll action between Towns and Butler deserves it’s own breakdown; consider all of the options that the Wolves have out of that set. It starts with Butler having the option to drive or shoot a jumper or throw the ball to KAT at the elbow. And once Towns had the ball, he could have shot, drove, or handed the ball off to Butler as he cut towards the paint. But Towns waited and threw a perfect pass that led to a layup.

Somewhat surprisingly, Towns’ assist rate is actually down so far this season, although it’s surely a function of getting less overall touches in the offense. Over the past few weeks, however, Towns has been making all of the correct reads and contributing to the offense in more ways than simply scoring.

Next: Timberwolves Podcast: On Jimmy G., KAT's improvement

If Towns has truly turned a corner on both ends of the floor, then the Wolves have two legitimate All-Stars on their roster, and they may not be far from boasting two players that find their way onto the All-NBA teams at the end of the year, either.