Atlanta Hawks<\/a>, and I can tell you that few things have ever been more refreshing than going from that nightmare to this experience of levity.<\/p>\nAdvertisement<\/p>\n
The Wolves, to their discredit, have been a team that starts seasons slowly. Each of the past few years, we have entered January with questionable losses on the schedule and roster questions that great teams rarely have. However, the recent stretch of games seems to signal that time is a flat circle and the Timberwolves are once again starting to figure things out.<\/p>\n
With that exciting possibility on the horizon, let\u2019s get into some more minutia of this game, from Rudy Gobert\u2019s dominance to the continued roll call of point guards.<\/p>\n
Let\u2019s get to it.<\/p>\n
The Frightening Frenchman<\/p>\n
No one has been a better defender in the league this year than Rudolph the Red Nosed Gobert (I know we\u2019re a few weeks past this, but I never got to use it). The moment to moment impact he provides has been ridiculous, resulting in a defense that is nearly 18 points better with him on the court than off it.<\/p>\n
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While tonight\u2019s performance was no less special (as you can see in the clip above), the thing that stood out was Gobert\u2019s newfound offensive groove.<\/p>\n
I wrote a piece a few years ago about how the supersized lineup was coming back and how valuable second chance points would be in a league that was trying to find more and more ways to manufacture extra possessions. The two primary ways to add those extra possessions are a) forcing live ball turnovers and\/or moving the ball fast enough to regain clock later (ie. pace) or b) finding those chances on the glass.<\/p>\n
Tonight was seemingly a battle between those two paths. The Heat\u2019s high paced offense was completely frozen out, while Gobert had four offensive rebounds and 13 points.<\/p>\n
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There is no player more controversial than the man both titled as \u201cthe Stifle Tower\u201d and \u201cBaguette Boy\u201d \u2014 for good reason \u2014 but in finding a way to be a high level contributor on the side of the ball on which he has long since been seen as a liability, well\u2026 unfortunately, nothing will change about how he\u2019s seen anyway, but it is certainly good for the Wolves!<\/p>\n
The Following Frenchman<\/p>\n
While much of the focus will be on the old guard of Wolves\u2019 bigs, there were few things more fun tonight than the sudden, all too unexpected arrival of Joan Beringer. Less than a day after being recalled from the Iowa Wolves, the rookie first round pick got some garbage time run against a starting caliber center in Ware.<\/p>\n
He responded by doing what all fans hope to see from an exciting youngster glued to the bench and proved he is ready for some real minutes, even if it is only to keep Gobert fresh for the post-season.<\/p>\n
When so much of the conversation surrounding Minnesota\u2019s potential deadline moves is about finding a suitable backup for Rudy, a player like Beringer is so quickly forgotten. There are few players that impressed more during summer league. There are few situations worse for Joan to get immediate attention. And yet, here he is, catching passes from Joe Ingles and turning the last four minutes of a one sided game into a think piece.<\/p>\n
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The movements are far more fluid than they have any right to be. The tip ins had great touch and the glass was alive with the sound of putbacks. Most importantly, the minutes are coming.<\/p>\n
Considering the abject failure of both 2024 draft picks in Rob Dillingham and Terrence Shannon Jr. this season, it\u2019s fun to finally see someone who could flank the young (ish) trio of Naz Reid, Jaden McDaniels, and Anthony Edwards. If Beringer becomes that, I will think of nights like tonight and smile to myself.<\/p>\n
Wolves basketball was, for once, just fun.<\/p>\n
Goodnight Wolves fans, enjoy the win!<\/p>\n
Up Next<\/p>\n
The Wolves will look to keep the momentum going against the surprisingly unstable Cleveland Cavaliers on Thursday, January 8 at 7:00pm CT. This will be the first meeting of the two teams. Donovan Mitchell, the fourth leading scorer in the league, sat out their previous game for rest. Minnesota will get Spida and the Cavs at full strength.<\/p>\n
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Highlights<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"MINNEAPOLIS, MINNESOTA \u2013 JANUARY 06: Anthony Edwards #5 of the Minnesota Timberwolves reacts against the Miami Heat in…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":521975,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[375,208,1179,7,193,864,372,377,151,1441,189,2113,307,152,520,6,72260,977,373,1010,1249,3687],"class_list":["post-521974","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nba","tag-anthony-edwards","tag-atlanta-hawks","tag-bam-adebayo","tag-basketball","tag-cleveland-cavaliers","tag-donovan-mitchell","tag-donte-divincenzo","tag-jaden-mcdaniels","tag-joan-beringer","tag-joe-ingles","tag-miami-heat","tag-minneapolis","tag-minnesota","tag-minnesota-timberwolves","tag-naz-reid","tag-nba","tag-red-nosed-gobert","tag-rob-dillingham","tag-rudy-gobert","tag-target-center","tag-terrence-shannon-jr","tag-the-wolves"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/115852510823182851","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/521974","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=521974"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/521974\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/521975"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=521974"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=521974"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=521974"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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