kekgeek1 wrote:5 games left. Will probably need to go 5-0 or 4-1. To avoid the play in
ESPN said the Wolves have the easiest remaining schedule, and I agree. We should be favored in every game except possibly the road game against the Nets, so I have us going 4-1 and finishing tied for 5th with GS and the Clippers...and we have the tiebreaker. But if we go 3-2, we very likely end up in the play in.
I'm not sure 5th place is something we really want though...a healthy Suns team with home court advantage is a tough match up for us. Doesn't matter though...just gotta play hard and try to win every game, and go into the playoffs playing our best basketball.
I'm just saying going 4-1 means the clippers would have to go 2-3 in the last 5 games for the wolves to catch them. Warriors have a pretty easy schedule also.
FNG wrote:Very poorly played game, yet we still went 2-1 on a tough road trip. Our bigs just didn't take care of the ball tonight...18 of our 21 turnovers were by Rudy, KAT, SloMo and Naz!
Defense was great though, and you gotta tip your hat to flu-stricken Ant who scores 31 and adds 6 assists.
Don't lump Naz in with the others. Naz only had 1 turnover tonight. Rudy had 6 while KAT and Anderson each had five.
I know...that was unfair to Naz I was trying to contrast our bigs versus our guards, because our guards only had 3 turnovers in 93 minutes...that's extraordinary. I guess I could have said our guards and Naz only had 4 turnovers, but that seemed kind of weird.
I'm not sure, but it seemed to me that at least half of Rudy and KAT's turnovers were offensive fouls. And I didn't disagree with any of the calls. We need to be much better at setting screens than we were tonight.
I'm not going to lose any sleep over this loss though. We lost this game because of sloppy fouling and because we didn't take care of the ball. We shot and rebounded better than the Suns tonight, but we had 13 more turnovers and 8 more fouls (and I recognize there is some double counting here since offensive fouls add to both totals)...you're not going to win many games with those numbers. But the good news is we are going to win the turnover battle most nights, and that bodes well for the playoffs. The Wolves were 2nd worst in the league in turnover frequency prior to the trade deadline, and this team was going nowhere with a continuation of that trend. It's good to see our turnover frequency has gone down sizably since the deadline.
kekgeek1 wrote:5 games left. Will probably need to go 5-0 or 4-1. To avoid the play in
ESPN said the Wolves have the easiest remaining schedule, and I agree. We should be favored in every game except possibly the road game against the Nets, so I have us going 4-1 and finishing tied for 5th with GS and the Clippers...and we have the tiebreaker. But if we go 3-2, we very likely end up in the play in.
I'm not sure 5th place is something we really want though...a healthy Suns team with home court advantage is a tough match up for us. Doesn't matter though...just gotta play hard and try to win every game, and go into the playoffs playing our best basketball.
I'm just saying going 4-1 means the clippers would have to go 2-3 in the last 5 games for the wolves to catch them. Warriors have a pretty easy schedule also.
Such a huge game on Friday.
Yeah, Friday will be huge indeed. I think we'll be a 3-4 point favorite (assuming we're over the flu bug), but beating a team with LeBron and AD is never easy.
I think the Clippers will go 2-3 though. Memphis has had their day off, and they won't play their JV again Friday. and road games in New Orleans and Phoenix would be challenging even if the Clippers had Paul George. Even one of their home games isn't really a home game, because they play the Lakers on a neutral court. 2-3 at best.
And the Warriors are one of the worst road teams in the Association (9-29 this season), and they are going to have a tough time winning in Denver and Sacramento (although they will win in Portland).
The schedule is in our favor...we need to take advantage of it.
FNG wrote:One of Rudy's strong points in his career has been setting screens without fouling...I've been admiring it all year. But tonight it's like he's forgotten everything he ever knew about setting screens. Very bad game for rudy
The fouls were bad, but his 6 turnovers were worse. He's been playing really well the last month or so it was a bummer for him to have such a terrible game tonight. Unfortunately, Rudy typically turns the ball over way too much for a center who isn't a focal point of the offense. I love his rebounding, but the fouls, turnovers and lack of versatility combine into a major drag in these high-intensity playoff-type games. If he were blocking 3-4 shots per game or scoring 20 points per game, then maybe the other stuff wouldn't be such a drag.
But it wasn't just Rudy tonight. Jaden had a bad offensive game and Anderson turned the ball over five times. KAT also had 5 turnovers, but I can overlook those turnovers given his overall production and scoring efficiently tonight.
It's tough to win five in a row in the NBA - especially all on the road against good teams. The Wolves just need to close out the season by winning their last five.
To be fair... the fouls WERE the TOs for the most part. All those screens count as both.
Now... SOME of them might have actually been fouls. But just like on offense, defensive players are also tricking officials into calls by throwing their bodies around.
I thought the Wolves got a lousy whistle... but the screening calls went both ways. I think there were SEVEN of them called tonight. There's not an NBA fan in the world who wants to see that crap. It's such a subjective thing... they could call 30 of them every game if they wanted to.
Thanks for posting, kek...very interesting Rudy is too much of a whiner for my taste (although I appreciate what he brings to this team) so I take his comments with a grain of salt. But I didn't like the offensive foul call when Booker was on him, and I agree that he does seem to get hit in the face a lot with no calls. I do get tired of his constant whining though even when there is an obvious foul called on him...to me it's worse even than KAT was last year.
But Finchie has a lot of credibility with me, so his words hit hard. That's as angry as I've seen him, so I know there is something there.
But I'm not blaming this one on the refs...it wasn't their fault we turned the ball over 21 times. We need to play better.
Thanks for posting, kek...very interesting Rudy is too much of a whiner for my taste (although I appreciate what he brings to this team) so I take his comments with a grain of salt. But I didn't like the offensive foul call when Booker was on him, and I agree that he does seem to get hit in the face a lot with no calls. I do get tired of his constant whining though even when there is an obvious foul called on him...to me it's worse even than KAT was last year.
But Finchie has a lot of credibility with me, so his words hit hard. That's as angry as I've seen him, so I know there is something there.
But I'm not blaming this one on the refs...it wasn't their fault we turned the ball over 21 times. We need to play better.
He's literally been hit in the face twice in two games and hasn't had a review on it. If it was you I'm pretty sure you be pissed too.
Phoenix really did amp up the intensity in that 3rd quarter. Whether it was their defense or the Wolves just getting sticky with the ball (or a bit of both probably), the Wolves really struggled for good looks. Their offense bogged down and the Suns took advantage.
That Biyambo foul on Naz was the turning point of the game imo. He should have at least been reviewed for a flagrant (even if we didnt get the flagrant call) he hit Naz twice in the face which caused his hand to catch the net. Instead Naz made one of two and was visibly out of it for a few possessions. I thought that was way more egregious than any of the calls on Rudy.
