Minnesota Sports Forum

Awesome win and another game where we overcame some biased officiating against us.

lipoli390 wrote:Well, nice inbound by Prince to Towns for the win!! :)

Gotta give Mitchell credit for that play call. It's very rare in an end-of-game situation with just a few ticks on the clock to get that clean of a look in the low block. It's usually a tough iso-perimeter shot for a wing.

60WinTim wrote:

lipoli390 wrote:Looks like we might catch up to New Orleans in the standings and end up with the 6th rather than 5th pick. But I'm ok with that as the price of winning these games to close out the season.

It would be a tie, wouldn't it? Doesn't it go to a coin flip?

Sort of. If the Wolves win their last two games and the Pellies lose their last two, the teams would be tied. In that case the two teams divide up equally the "chances" to win the lottery, so the Wolves would have just a slightly lower chance of finishing in the top 3. But if neither the Wolves or the Pelicans won the lottery and moved into the top three, a coin toss would be used to determine who drafts before the other. So technically, if three teams behind Minnesota or New Orleans won the lottery and moved up into the top three, Minnesota could draft as low as 9th if they lost the coin toss (but the chances of that are about 1 out of a thousand). As the attached chart shows, the Wolves will have about a 25% chance of moving into the top three, but the most likely scenario (regardless of whether they tie with NO or not) is that they draft 6th.

.https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NBA_draft_lottery

The most important thing though is to win these last two games...finishing the season with 5 consecutive wins and 14 more wins than last season would be terrific for this franchise and put them in a confident frame of mind to start next season.

Thanks, LST. I had forgotten the details about how it worked... Something to do with getting older, I believe.

And you either have way to much time on your hands, or the topic was right up your ally with what you are doing now. I hope it is the latter!

And YES, winning in April is something the Wolves have not done in many years. It feels GREAT, and validates the feelings we have on our young core going forward!

So nice seeing this team finish the year strong. Too late to change my moniker but we've moved well beyond bizarro :-)

Camden wrote:I'm really tired of Aminu always finding his three-point stroke when he plays us. He's not a good shooter, but throw a Minnesota player in front of him and he's a different player. 32.1% from 3P for his career, 41.4% from 3P when he plays us.

Wes Matthews passed on his secrets.

lipoli390 wrote:

Camden0916 wrote:Just as Minnesota gains the momentum and has a mismatch in their favor with Crabbe buried underneath on Bjelica, Mitchell calls a timeout... Huh? You really can't make this stuff up.

I was watching the game with my wife and she said exactly the same thing. As you and I both know, Sam does this sort of thing over and over again. It's just plain weird.

It was a weird timeout I was watching via the Blazers broadcast and they said it was weird also.

Camden0916 wrote:If Tyus and Bjelica can be the players they've been over their last 10 in their sophomore seasons, that would be a huge help. Go from having five reliable players to seven just that quickly. It would make a big impact, IMO.

I was thinking somewhat the same thing. If Belly is the player we have seen lately they would be a pretty nice 1-2 punch at PF and if the a wolves got a good player with their draft pick at another. Spot that wouldn't be all bad.

60WinTim wrote:

lipoli390 wrote:Note that the first guy to run out and hug KAT at the end was Bazz. Also note his key contribution with 12 points off the bench. His defense has improved and he passed the ball well tonight. I like him as a 6th or 7th man off the bench who can score AND rebound while providing high energy.

Bazz gives Sam a good option against teams that go small. Bazz got a lot of Dieng's minutes against Golden State. Nice flexibility to have: Dieng against teams that go big, Bazz against teams that go small. (of course, it was Prince that got a bunch of minutes tonight, but that inbound pass was worth it!)

I've been trying to watch Bazz on defense a decent chunk of possessions lately and have done so a lot of the year. He has been rock solid lately. I would guess the switching defense probably helps him but I don't watch the game recently and think oh no Bazz is killing the team defensively. That's pretty big because it's really his biggest flaw. He had a pretty nice game against the Blazers. There are some other flawed wing players that have found their games on the other side of the ball in their mid 20's maybe Bazz could do the same.

Heck of a win. Everyone that played for the Wolves played well and it was a pretty short rotation. Other than the bench doing well I thought the defense was there most of the night. The Blazers broadcast crew kept giving the Wolves credit for the D they were playing.