The Minnesota Timberwolves started Week Three without Karl-Anthony Towns and finished it without either of their regular point guards.
After a Week One that saw the Minnesota Timberwolves ranked far too highly and a Week Two that saw some accurate course corrections across the board, the Wolves had a suspension and injury-riddled Week Three.
That meant that the Wolves went just 1-3 over the course of the week, which led to a bit of a slide down the power rankings across the board.
The loss against Milwaukee wasn’t inexcusable, as Karl-Anthony Towns was out due to suspension and the Wolves were in the game throughout the first half.
The Memphis loss was atrocious, although Jeff Teague and Shabazz Napier both missed the game. The duo also sat out the overtime win over the Golden State Warriors on Friday as D’Angelo Russell went for 52 points.
They were out on Sunday, too, as the Wolves lost an overtime game to the Denver Nuggets. Since then, and not included in these rankings, Minnesota won at the Pistons, also without their point guards.
All things considered, the Wolves are 2-2 without either of their point guards and took one of the best teams in the league to overtime. So it isn’t all bad.
Let’s look at where each of the sites had the Wolves this week.
ESPN
Last Week: No. 12
This Week: No. 16
After a No. 15 ranking in Week One and a climb to No. 12 in Week Two, the Wolves slid back down below their initial ranking to No. 16.
ESPN didn’t give much reasoning for their ranking, but the No. 13 to 16 range feels about right.
NBA.com
Last Week: No. 7
This Week: No. 13
The Wolves dropped from No. 7 all the way to No. 13. Of course, they were still ranked higher on NBA.com than anywhere else.
NBA.com always does a great job providing some context for their rankings, and they noted that the Wolves were playing without Teague and Napier and astutely point out that the Wolves are giving up less than a point per possession with both Josh Okogie and Robert Covington on the floor together.
CBS Sports
Last Week: No. 9
This Week: No. 16
CBS points out that the Wolves’ late-game balance between Towns and Andrew Wiggins seems a bit off, and that’s a fair way to characterize their crunch time offense.
Lately, Wiggins has been controlling the ball and Towns has largely been getting out of the way and launching threes from the perimeter. It’s largely working, however, so it will be interesting to see how the Wolves’ late-game offense evolves moving forward.
SI.com’s The Crossover
Last Week: No. 7
This Week: No. 16
The Crossover gave the Wolves their largest drop of any of the sites we took a look at and also passed along the most pointed criticism of the team, calling out Towns’ lack of consistency on the defensive end of the floor as one of the Wolves’ key issues.
That’s three No. 16 rankings and a No. 13 in what was a consistent performance across the board for the Wolves, who continue to tread water without their top two options at the point guard spot.