Another gut punch for the Timberwolves

PLUS: Maybe Miami is just not very good?

Good morning. Let’s basketball.

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Miranda — The Tempest; John William Waterhouse; 1916

The Minnesota Timberwolves — on the road, missing their best wing defender due to him breaking his hand punching a wall during a basketball, missing their best rim protector due to him punching a teammate in broad daylight during a basketball game — had a 15-point lead on the L.A. Lakers in the third quarter. They went into the fourth leading 86-79. The playoffs — a revenge date with the Memphis Grizzlies, in fact — was within reach despite their Sunday self-destruction.

Had the Timberwolves scored just 13 points in the entire fourth quarter, they would have scored enough to win. Alas, they scored just 10 points in the first 11 minutes and 58 seconds of the fourth quarter, and only survived to overtime thanks to a completely boneheaded Anthony Davis foul on a desperate Mike Conley corner three attempt basically at the buzzer.

Minnesota in the fourth quarter: 3/15 shooting (11 of those shots being threes), just one offensive rebound, six turnovers, no free throws until the AD foul on Conley, just two shots in the paint all quarter. There was no movement, no creativity, no verve at all in the fourth. The Timberwolves looked like they were holding on for dear life … with a relatively small lead … with the Lakers struggling to hit shots and play clean too. It was pretty painful to watch.

Anthony Edwards struggled like crazy all night, largely with Jared Vanderbilt watching him. But he had Austin Reaves guarding him in clutch time, and couldn’t do anything with it. Davis looming at the rim certainly impacted Edwards’ interest in driving inside. But how many long jumpers can you miss before you just go for it? Here’s Ant’s shot chart.

Brutal. Of course, that the Timberwolves were a shot away from winning a game in which Rudy Gobert and Jaden McDaniels were out and Edwards was bottled speaks to the fact that the Lakers weren’t exactly clicking on all cylinders. Even in overtime the Lakers had some atrocious turnovers that kept the Wolves alive. L.A.’s defense overall was on point, but I suspect they’ll be drilling sideline out-of-bounds situations all week.

In any case, however it happened, the L.A. Lakers are officially in the playoffs, which did not seem likely for long stretches of this season. As the No. 7 seed, they’ll face the Grizzlies — yes, Dillon Brooks will be back in Staples Center. Meanwhile, the Wolves will have another crack at it Friday against the winner of Pelicans/Thunder. One presumes Gobert will back for that one. And one also presumes that Edwards, who is an exponentially better offensive player than he showed on Tuesday, will perform at a much higher level.

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Scores

Hawks 116, Heat 105 — There are two competing lessons from the Heat’s embarrassing loss to the Hawks in the East 7-8 play-in. The lesson is either:

The 2022-23 Miami Heat, who never had a single confidence-inducing stretch despite adding Kyle Lowry to last season’s No. 1 seed roster, are simply a level of mediocre befitting their No. 7 seed.

-OR-

You avoid the play-in like the plague because anything can happen in the play-in.

Of course, both could be true in degrees. I simply cannot believe this Heat roster is this bad. This team, mostly intact, went to the NBA Finals in 2020 and got to within a shot of the Finals last spring. But then again, in between those seasons Miami had a down year with a swift first round exit in 2021. Maybe this is the cycle. Maybe the mere fact that this Heat team could never get going for a couple of weeks was an indication there was a missing ingredient.

That doesn’t explain why the Hawks — a team Miami has thoroughly dominated — looked amazing and ALIVE against the Heat. Atlanta shot poorly from long-range but absolutely dominated in the paint and on the glass. The Hawks had 22 offensive rebounds in 53 opportunities — that’s a 42% offensive rebounding rate. You can shoot terribly. But if you get almost half of those misses, that makes up a lot of ground.

In a great irony, Kyle Lowry had probably his best game as a Heatian (33 on 11/16 shooting, 5 assists, 4 rebounds, no turnovers) and it won’t count in the official records because The Play-In Is A Statistical Mirage.

The Celtics breathe a minor sigh of relief by drawing the Hawks in the first round. The Heat need to be the winner of Bulls/Raptors on Friday just to get into the playoffs. Miami went 1-6 against those teams combined this season. Butler missed two of those games, Bam Adebayo missed one.

Timberwolves 102, Lakers 108 (OT)

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Schedule

All times Eastern.

Bulls at Raptors, 7, ESPN
Thunder at Pelicans, 9:30, ESPN

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Be excellent to each other.