Reliving the Minnesota Timberwolves’ loss to the Philadelphia 76ers
By Adi Zhuravel
Earlier this week, the Minnesota Timberwolves lost to the Philadelphia 76ers by a score of 117-95. Sure, there was a lot of distractions, but let’s just stick to the basketball and talk about what happened.
Minnesota Timberwolves head coach Ryan Saunders showed a lot of creativity last year with his team’s lineups, but there hasn’t been quite as much outside-the-box thinking thus far this season.
The Wolves continued with their small-ball lineup against the massive Philadelphia 76ers on Wednesday night and they simply got outmuscled.
The Sixers pulled down 22 more rebounds than the Wolves, including 10 more on the offensive end. Power forward Robert Covington had three rebounds compared to counterpart Al Horford’s 16. But the biggest mismatch looked like it was at point guard: Jeff Teague and Shabazz Napier combined for only one rebound in 50 total minutes. Whoever matched up with Teague or Napier on the perimeter crashed the glass, and that’s really how most of the offensive rebounds were taken.
Teague might be listed at the same size as Russell Westbrook, but he plays much smaller. Raul Neto was the only player on the court that is similar in size to Napier or Teague, and he only played tow minutes. Everyone else that played for the Sixers is 6-foot-6 or taller.
Offensively the Sixers mostly wanted to post up to take advantage of the size difference. Playing another big like Noah Vonleh at the 4 could have really helped, especially since Ben Simmons still refuses to shoot anything outside of three feet away from the rim.
The Sixers essentially put Joel Embiid on Treveon Graham and dared him to shoot, and that’s what the Wolves should’ve done with Simmons by playing Vonleh on him while doubling on Embiid to help Towns in the paint.
For his part, Andrew Wiggins looked uninvolved for most of the game. On one possession, he just put his hands on his knees and rested while his teammates played. But then watching him with the ball in his hands he looks aggressive, had good shot selection, and even distributed to open shooters on his drives.
This may have been the game to try playing Wiggins at point guard, but Saunders clearly didn’t feel that way. With Wiggins at point, Josh Okogie could’ve played more with starters at the shooting guard spot and helped the team even more on the glass to even things out.
Next. Wolves players who must step-up in Towns' absence. dark
Lets hope Saunders and staff learned from this game. When the two teams meat again on March 24, it should be much more competitive.