The Timberwolves will look to have another successful mini road trip as they kick things off with a winnable game against the 14-35 Atlanta Hawks.
Another day, another start of a back-to-back set for the Timberwolves.
Or, at least it seems that way. The Wolves recent swoon (if you call four losses in their last seven games a “swoon”) can, at least in part, be attributed to a tough schedule, back-to-backs, a lot of road games, and injuries to Jimmy Butler and Jamal Crawford.
If you take a step back, you’ll notice that Minnesota is on a 10-game home winning streak, and this side of a blowout loss in Portland and some shoddy defense, the sky isn’t exactly falling at Target Center.
And while the cellar-dwelling Hawks don’t exactly present themselves as a formidable road opponent, it’s hard to forget that the Wolves slogged through an ugly, 98-97 loss in Brooklyn less than four weeks ago. There certainly should be some concern related to looking past Atlanta and towards the Tuesday night showdown with the Raptors just 24 hours after tip-off against the Hawks.
In the meantime, here’s what to look out for at Philips Arena on Monday.
1. Defend the 3-point line
After allowing Brooklyn to brick their way to a loss on Saturday night, the Wolves will face a similar but different challenge against the Hawks.
Atlanta launches 29.5 3-point attempts per game, which ranks them 13th in the NBA. They’re eighth in percentage made, however, shooting 36.9 percent as a team from behind the arc.
Outside of long-range shooting, however, the Hawks offense isn’t particularly good. They lean on the likes of Taurean Prince, Marco Belinelli, Kent Bazemore, and Dennis Schroder to get hot from beyond the arc and lead them to victory, as outside of knocking down threes, this Hawks offense isn’t anything to write home about.
The Wolves need to remember which guys they can’t let have what I’ll call “Quincy Acy space”; Minnesota routinely left Nets big man Quincy Acy wide open on the perimeter on Saturday, and it worked out to their favor. They can’t do that with Prince (40.1 percent), Bazemore (37.4 percent), or Belinelli (36.4 percent). It’s okay to leave Schroder and his 29.5 percent open, but he’s about the only one you’d be comfortable letting it fly from outside the arc.
(For more on the Wolves allowing too many open and semi-open 3-point attempts, check out my post-Nets look at their recent pick-and-roll coverage.)
2. Attack the paint
For as up-and-down as the Hawks are on offense, they’re downright bad on the defensive end of the floor.
Atlanta is 26th in defensive rating, and while they don’t allow a crazy number of free throw attempts, they don’t many true rim protectors in their regular rotation. Miles Plumlee block rate is just 3.1 percent, and reserve John Collins and his 4.6 percent block rate play only 22 minutes per game.
The Wolves should be able to get into the paint against the Hawks’ poor perimeter defenders, as both Schroder and Belinelli can be beaten off the dribble with ease. Andrew Wiggins, Jimmy Butler, and Jeff Teague should both be heading towards the paint with their first step and not settling for tough mid-range jumpers.
Next: Checking in on the Timberwolves ICE defensive scheme...
We’ll have a recap and some key takeaways following the game here at Dunking With Wolves.