{"id":583729,"date":"2026-02-05T08:40:20","date_gmt":"2026-02-05T08:40:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/583729\/"},"modified":"2026-02-05T08:40:20","modified_gmt":"2026-02-05T08:40:20","slug":"new-orleans-takes-on-minnesota-following-murphys-44-point-showing","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/583729\/","title":{"rendered":"New Orleans takes on Minnesota following Murphy’s 44-point showing"},"content":{"rendered":"

New Orleans Pelicans<\/a> (13-40, 14th in the Western Conference) vs. Minnesota Timberwolves<\/a> (32-20, fifth in the Western Conference)<\/p>\n

Minneapolis; Friday, 8 p.m. EST<\/p>\n

BOTTOM LINE: New Orleans plays the Minnesota Timberwolves after Trey Murphy III<\/a> scored 44 points in the Pelicans’ 141-137 overtime loss to the Milwaukee Bucks.<\/p>\n

The Timberwolves have gone 18-15 against Western Conference opponents. Minnesota is third in the Western Conference scoring 119.6 points while shooting 48.3% from the field.<\/p>\n

The Pelicans are 7-26 in Western Conference play. New Orleans leads the Western Conference with 57.2 points per game in the paint led by Zion Williamson<\/a> averaging 15.4.<\/p>\n

The Timberwolves’ 14.4 made 3-pointers per game this season are only 0.4 fewer made shots on average than the 14.8 per game the Pelicans give up. The Pelicans average 11.0 made 3-pointers per game this season, 1.4 fewer made shots on average than the 12.4 per game the Timberwolves give up.<\/p>\n

The teams meet for the third time this season. The Timberwolves won 125-116 in the last meeting on Dec. 5. Julius Randle<\/a> led the Timberwolves with 28 points, and Murphy led the Pelicans with 21 points.<\/p>\n

TOP PERFORMERS: Randle is scoring 22.1 points per game with 6.8 rebounds and 5.4 assists for the Timberwolves. Anthony Edwards<\/a> is averaging 29.3 points and 5.7 rebounds while shooting 47.4% over the last 10 games.<\/p>\n

Derik Queen<\/a> is averaging 12.2 points, 7.3 rebounds and 4.3 assists for the Pelicans. Murphy is averaging 21.7 points over the last 10 games.<\/p>\n

LAST 10 GAMES: Timberwolves: 5-5, averaging 118.1 points, 45.7 rebounds, 25.4 assists, 9.4 steals and 6.7 blocks per game while shooting 47.0% from the field. Their opponents have averaged 116.0 points per game.<\/p>\n

Pelicans: 3-7, averaging 112.5 points, 44.8 rebounds, 24.7 assists, 9.3 steals and 5.8 blocks per game while shooting 44.1% from the field. Their opponents have averaged 115.7 points.<\/p>\n

INJURIES: Timberwolves: Terrence Shannon Jr.: out (foot).<\/p>\n

Pelicans: Dejounte Murray: out (leg).<\/p>\n

___<\/p>\n

The Associated Press created this story using technology provided by Data Skrive and data from Sportradar.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"New Orleans Pelicans (13-40, 14th in the Western Conference) vs. Minnesota Timberwolves (32-20, fifth in the Western Conference)…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":156982,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[3796],"tags":[7,6,478,470,4073,4072,675],"class_list":{"0":"post-583729","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-new-orleans-pelicans","8":"tag-basketball","9":"tag-nba","10":"tag-new-orleans","11":"tag-new-orleans-pelicans","12":"tag-neworleans","13":"tag-neworleanspelicans","14":"tag-pelicans"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/116017131356442652","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/583729","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=583729"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/583729\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/156982"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=583729"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=583729"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=583729"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}