Post game observations - Minny vs. NO

[Q12543 [enjin:6621299]]

That's a very good win against a team that was a half-game behind us in the playoff race. These games against conference rivals are just critical and the win tonight offers a bit of relief from the pain of losing to Dallas.

- Ricky picked up where he left off the other night with very solid play, except tonight he scored well too. His 8 rebounds, 9 assists, 3 steals, and 2 blocks in 32 minutes is what stands out. Ricky doesn't need to do much else if he's putting up those kind of numbers in the other facets of his game.

- We won on an "off" night from Love, and that's a really good thing.

- Look at the +/-. Our starting lineup once again walloped the opposing team's starting lineup. And.....

- Our bench came through for us. Barea, Cunningham, and Shved - the three goats from our outing against Dallas - all had good games. Anyone glad Love called them out? I sure as hell am.

- Mbah Moute quietly had a solid game. I know he had a couple of bad turnovers, but his defense on Evans was terrific. Evans is the perfect kind of matchup for Luc because he has the strength to not get knocked out of the play on his drives. Brewer tends to get whisked away by really strong wings that like to bull their way to the hoop.

- Hummel is quickly losing favor with me. The guy can't keep missing open 3-point shots. That's why he's on our roster instead of Othyus Jeffers, who is probably better than Hummel at every other basketball skill, except shooting.

The OKC game is an opportunity to make up some ground. I think a lot of us had that earmarked as a loss when we looked ahead at the schedule a couple weeks ago. With that being a home game and OKC without Westbrook, it would be great to get a win.

Go Wolves!

[worldK]

Good observations Q.

I really like rubio crashing the boards the last few games. Him getting rebounds and starting the fast break is a positive for the team. he is shooting better as well, which always helps.

Good blowout win tonight. Its strange that we have so many blowout wins already this season and yet we are hovering around the .500 mark.

[Q12543 [enjin:6621299]]

Worldk, I agree on Rubio hitting the boards. He's actually one of the top rebounding PGs in the NBA. Granted, the difference between a great rebounding PG and an average one is only a couple boards per game, so it's not game-changing, but it does lead to better transition opportunities because he is so good at finding guys in the open court, like you said.

The incongruency between our average margin of victory and actual record is highly, highly unusual. Even if we just flipped a coin in the close games we've had, we would be 4 games over .500 right now. But I thought Jim Petersen mentioned something that was really enlightening to me: Indiana is 0-2 in games decided by 4 points or less, which mostly means they beat their opponents handily. Now just think if we had an even average bench. We'd probably be 0-4 in close games instead of 0-8 because we would have had more comfortable victories like the one we had tonight.

[Camden [enjin:6601484]]

Good observations Q.

I really like rubio crashing the boards the last few games. Him getting rebounds and starting the fast break is a positive for the team. he is shooting better as well, which always helps.

Good blowout win tonight. Its strange that we have so many blowout wins already this season and yet we are hovering around the .500 mark.

0-8 in close games right? Even if we split the close games, that'd be four wins we don't have. That's where our record needs help. Should be at least 20-12 right now, but oh well. All we can do is get better.

Looks lime Philly's going to get a win over Denver tonight. The Nuggets have had a rough couple weeks. I'll take losses from Western playoff contenders every time I can get it.

Would be huge for us to get a win over OKC Saturday. Next four games are pretty big honestly. OKC, PHI, PHO, CHA. Coin flip, should win, coin flip, should win. Praying we can go 4-0 through that stretch before the Spurs game.

[Camden [enjin:6601484]]

J.J. Barea said he didn't like Love calling out the bench on Monday night. Love said no ill will, just tough love. Was happy for subs today.

[Q12543 [enjin:6621299]]

Yeah, Denver and LAL are in a free fall right now. Denver is still in the mix record-wise, but I don't know how you recover from 7 straight losses. I'm not sure what happened to them....

[worldK]

J.J. Barea said he didn't like Love calling out the bench on Monday night. Love said no ill will, just tough love. Was happy for subs today.

Personally, I have no problem with love's action. It is what it is, 5pts by the bench is bad production. Tough to win if your only getting 5pts and not much else from your bench. JJ is a competitive guy. I think he is just trying to fire himself up and hopefully the bench as well with what he said.

[worldK]

Q, we agree that rebounding is 1 aspect of rubios game that he can really work on and help him in his overall game and effectiveness. He has always rebounded well for his position and he has good anticipation. Love and pek are a very good rebounding duo but with martin and brewer at the wings, there are plenty of boards still available for rubio to grab.

J kidd and rondo are 2 pgs that crash the boards hard. I hope rubio can keep on doing that as he can immediately push the ball down and thats where he is at his best. The time we save from a rebounder passig to rubio then starting the break to rubio getting the rebound himself and pushing it immediately is crucial as it can caught the defense off guard.

[Mstermisty [enjin:6864008]]

Just got back from the game. A solid crowd but they didnt get too into it simply because the
Wolves opened up a can of whoop ass early in the third and never looked back.

Ricky balled out tonight and he seems to be coming on of late. His defense was stellar, led the team in rebounds (surely going to give Kevin Love shit about this one), but most importantly he ran the offense beautifully. I don't want to jink it, but Rubio is showing signs of taking his game to the next level. Lets hope he keeps it going.

I think Kevin Love calling out the bench paid dividends. Everybody gave us something and even Shved had a solid game. Tonight's bench play would have resulted in 4 -5 more wins this season.

Anyway, good win, and again I don't want to jinx it, but I think this team is steadily improving and may be on the brink of getting back into the playoff picture. First tho, get above .500.

[quincy33 [enjin:7934959]]

J.J. Barea said he didn't like Love calling out the bench on Monday night. Love said no ill will, just tough love. Was happy for subs today.

link or i call bs