Lots of dunks, lots of smiles from Rudy Gay and the Grizz last night.

Welp, that was ugly.

I’m reminding myself not to complain. After all, the Wolves have been playing very well lately. They had won three games in a row for the second time this season before Wednesday night. They had moved to just over .500 for the first time since what feels like the Eisenhower Administration.

And honestly, one really can’t fault Minnesota’s effort. Sure, there were lapses, but as a whole, the Wolves played with what little energy they had left. Clearly, the team was exhausted, which is why Adelman went with a slightly unorthodox lineup at the end.

But since I don’t really have anything to complain about (most of Minnesota’s miscues were due to exhaustion rather than a lack of effort) and I don’t really have anything nice to say (there were still a TON of miscues), I think I’ll stick to mostly bullet points for this recap.

• Don’t be fooled by the final score, the Wolves lost this game by 10-15 points. Some inspired play in the final quarter by JJ Barea made the game closer, but without the Kevin Love and on the second night of a back to back, Memphis simply out-manned and out-ran Minnesota.
• Rudy Gay was a highlight reel all night. Got dayum, Rudy.
• You too, Jeremy Pargo.
• Ask any Celtics fan who has been following Rajon Rondo for the past few years, and they will tell you: Rubio is going to have games like this. There are going to be games in which the opposing team resolutely gives him whatever jumpshot he wants and focuses on stopping passing lanes. That’s what happened last night, and sure enough, Rubio struggled. Also, Mike Conley completely has his number. Not sure what that’s about.
• Here’s something weird: Wes Johnson has been missing all of his jumpers, and getting all of his points from aggressively driving to the basket. Not something you would have expected to hear a few weeks ago.
• You know your team is having an off night when Quincy Pondexter is one of the players responsible for beating you.
• Another solid box score for Pekovic with 10 points and 9 rebounds, but he really struggled against Gasol’s length when Gasol was in. On a night when other players are performing better, that kind of a mismatch won’t kill the Timberwolves. On a night when the rest of the starting lineup shoots 11-32 from the field, it’s just another nail in the proverbial coffin.
• Barea really was encouraging tonight. He probed the lane looking for easy baskets, but his range was really on display, as he shot 50% from behind the arc. Having Barea and Beasley back to create shots on their own should really help Minnesota’s offense going forward.

Ordinarily, I’d keep going, but last night was just such an uninspiring game. Minnesota will have a chance to get back over the .500 mark on Friday against a team they are surprisingly 2-0 against so far this season, the Dallas Mavericks. More important: Kevin Love will be back (thank you, sweet lord).

For today? GET SOME REST, GUYS. You need it.

Team	Offensive Efficiency	Defensive Efficiency
Memphis Grizzlies	97.2	97.3
Minnesota Timberwolves	101.2	100.0

Last game: Minnesota: W, 86-84 vs Sacramento, Memphis: L, 89-84 vs San Antonio

The Wolves face the Grizzlies in Memphis tonight.

The Timberwolves, somehow, despite Jimmer Fredette’s best efforts, and because of Nikola Pekovic’s, moved above the .500 mark for the first time since 2007, beating the Kings in Minnesota last night. It was the Wolves’ first of two games without Kevin Love, serving a suspension for stepping on Luis Scola’s face on Saturday.

An exhausted Grizzlies team fell to the Spurs on Monday, as three starters (Rudy Gay, Marc Gasol, and Mike Conley) played for more than 40 minutes. Gasol led the banged up Grizz with 22 points in a loss.

The Key Questions

#1. Why have the Grizzlies been losing so much this year?

Easy answer: injuries. Memphis was projected as a title contender early, but they have stumbled out of the gate to a 12-13 start, largely due to the gaping hole at power forward created by Zach Randolph’s torn right MCL. When he returns to the lineup in early March, don’t be surprised if the Grizzlies go on a bit of a tear.

Despite Randolph’s absence, the Grizzlies are still dangerous, and they have beaten the Wolves once already this year without Randolph. Plus they are 7-4 at home, which is where the Wolves face them tonight.

#2. Is Pekovic super awesome or just awesome?

As I was leaving the arena after the Houston game on Saturday, a vendor was holding up a jersey, shaking it so everyone would notice him. Love? Rubio? Nope. Nikola Pekovic. I almost regretted the Rubio Muskies jersey I had just purchased. Almost.

Pek has been super awesome, obviously. He was 9-12 from the field against Sacramento and grabbed 10 rebounds. More importantly, he was the only player on the floor for Minnesota who could score during the third quarter, keeping the Wolves in the game. He’s averaging 18.5 ppg in his last four games. Big, strong, and surprisingly talented, Pek might actually be my favorite subplot of the very young season.

#3. How did the bench perform, filling in for Love?

Surprisingly well, actually. Beasley took too many shots (7-21 from the field for 17 points) but he pulled down 14 rebounds and played with energy. I continue to think he makes a great sixth man off the bench. Derrick Williams got the start in Love’s place and scored 14 points on 5-10 shooting. He disappeared in the fourth quarter, save for the biggest shot of the game, a corner trey on a kick-out from Rubio.

They are a temporary fix, to be sure, but the tandem of Williams-Beasley should be able to fill in respectably for Love for one more game. Hopefully.

The Key Matchups

Last time these teams met, Beasley was matched up against Rudy Gay, who scored 19. This game, it will probably be Wes Johnson guarding Gay, which could be a problem. Wes’ biggest advantage as a defender is his length and athleticism, both of which are also strengths of Gay.

Don’t be surprised if Pek comes a little closer to Earth tonight. Gasol is incredibly long and talented…the kind of player we worry about Pek guarding. On the other hand, we worried about Pek a lot anyway, and look how dumb we look now.

The Grizzlies’ bench is getting pretty thin with all their injuries. Hopefully Minnesota preserved enough energy last night to try to run Memphis off the floor.

Tony Allen torched the Wolves for 20 last time they matched up. I like Ridnour, but matching him up with Allen scares me. Of course, we are also hoping that Allen, one of the best perimeter defenders in the NBA, doesn’t decide to guard Rubio tonight. Ugh.

The Outlook

This game could be tough. Although Memphis has a thin bench, they are also much more dangerous at home, and the Wolves had a difficult game last night. Plus, of course, they are without Love. Multiple players will have to step up for Minnesota if they are to have a chance tonight.

Game starts at 7 on Fox Sports North

Rubio doesn't need Love to shine

In the words of our dearly suspended missed superstar, Kevin Love, “Whoa. Too close for comfort. Got it done. Happy for the team. Great win.”

But just imagine what the margin would’ve been without the Wolves’ new sterling starting center Nikola Pekovic.

Alongside Ricky Rubio, Pek dominated the game basically from start to finish, squeaking out a big home win against the Sacramento Kings.

It’s actually hard to capture what this win really means to the Wolves. For starters, the last five games or so, they’ve battled to make it to that .500 milestone. It doesn’t seem like too big of a deal but for the Wolves, hitting .500 well into the season is a tremendous feat. But tonight, they thwarted that goal and pushed it to the max by inching above the .500 mark for the season. That’s got to be a momentum builder going forward.

More to build on from this one: Nikola Pekovic. It’s premature to say he’s making a name for himself around the NBA but he’s definitely reaching towards that echelon. His post-game is outstanding; the footwork, the touch around the basket, it all comes together in an oddly attractive package; you just can’t help but love him right now. He still remains one of the clumsiest behemoths I’ve ever seen but he uses it to his advantage. One way to truly interpret his improvements in the post was a play mid-way through the third quarter. (YouTube won’t let me embed the video, sorry.)

As you can see, Pek received the ball on the lower block and was immediately double-teamed by Evans. He sensed the double-team, spun one-footed off of Cousins’ shoulder down the baseline and soared upwards for the dunk. He made Demarcus Cousins pout all night long — literally. Pek’s improvements will be ringing around the league and rivalries will start to form — He and Cousins clearly don’t take a liking to each other already, especially after he laid out Cousins last season.

But without Rubio, Pek may not have played at the level he did tonight. Rubio did a beautiful job all night of allowing Pek to gain position down low and hit him with a pinpoint pass; All Pek had left to do was toss it in. Rubio set all of his teammates up, whether it was alley-oops or skip passes for open three pointers, all of his 14 assists were simply sexy. And it could’ve been better; if the Wolves had more accurate shooters, I believe Rubio would’ve had 20 assists tonight, no problem. His court vision but, perhaps, most of all, his hustle allows plays to develop in ways they really shouldn’t in the first place.

Rubio’s hustle translates beautifully to the defensive end, too. He was scrambling for lose balls — although he did get into foul trouble as a direct result but it also paid off in five steals. But what I noticed tonight, is that Rubio’s hustle was so damn contagious. Everyone was hustling on loose balls, grabbing boards, getting knocked down and getting right back up; one play from Anthony Tolliver, who should’ve drawn a charge, hit the floor and, from the floor, swatted the ball away from a King.

Thanks to that pure hustle all over the floor, the Wolves really snuck away with one tonight. But don’t be disappointed; silver linings laced this victory. From Pek’s emergence, Rubio’s leadership and Derrick Williams’ clutch play down the stretch, it was a special win in so many ways.

Next up comes the Memphis Grizzlies tomorrow night. The Wolves will travel without Love for one more game. If I’m convinced that tonight’s win was special, a win in Memphis without Love would be astronomically important.

Team	Offensive Efficiency	Defensive Efficiency
Memphis Grizzlies	97.2	97.3
Minnesota Timberwolves	101.2	100.0

Last game: Minnesota: W, 100-91 vs Houston, Sacramento: 100-92 vs New Orleans

Marcus Thornton has all your malicious intent.

Minnesota finally reached .500 defeating Houston 100-91 on Saturday night, but it came at a hefty price: the loss of Kevin Love for two games after he accidentally/on purpose stepped on Luis Scola’s face and chest. Love had 25 points and 18 rebounds in the Timberwolves victory, while Ricky Rubio contributed 13 points and 11 assists.

The Kings continued their two game winning streak by beating the Hornets yesterday in New Orleans, largely thanks to the beastly contributions of Demarcus Cousins, who scored 28 points and grabbed 19 rebounds in the win.

The Key Questions

#1. Umm, how are the Timberwolves supposed to get a win without Kevin Love?

Easy. Derrick Williams/Michael Beasley just need to play good, consistent basketball for four quarters filling in for him. They will need to take good shots, avoid the mid-range game whenever possible, post up when they can, and focus on getting to the hoop and drawing fouls. They will need to take threes only when they are open, get a lot of rebounds, and make great outlet passes.

Yikes.

#2. What will the Pekovic/Cousins matchup look like?

Cousins is considerably more talented than Darko. He is also more talented than Pek, but the biggest difference between Pek and Darko is Pekovic’s sheer, brutish strength down low. Cousins may find himself in more of a matchup struggle tonight. Pekovic’s personal fouls per 36 minutes have also gone down from a whopping 7.3 (meaning Pek would more than foul out in less than an entire game every time he was on the floor…) to a less whopping 4.9. Still a lot of fouls, but definitely a vast improvement.

#3. With Kevin Love out, who will step up for Minnesota?

Last time these two teams met, the Wolves were spurred on by Kevin Love’s 33-11 (not surprising) and Luke Ridnour’s 25 points and 9 assists (really really really surprising). The Wolves backcourt, in comparison to Sacramento’s, is severely undersized, but they came through big back in January. Hopefully we see another big performance.

The Key Matchups

We already discussed Pekovic vs Cousins. One of the biggest advantages Minnesota will have, as usual, is depth. Barea wasn’t playing last time these two met, so his return should help quite a bit.

Derrick Williams could do wonders for himself tonight with a big game. It would probably earn him some more minutes in the rotation, since Kevin Love has been playing almost 40 minutes per game (39.4). Williams could also do wonders for Minnesota if the Wolves are considering him as trade bait by making some real contributions apart from awesome Rubioop highlights.

The Outlook

Even without Love, this is a very winnable game. The Kings have a two game winning streak, but both wins came at the hands of mediocre teams (Golden State and New Orleans). If the Wolves can avoid a slow shooting start, they very well could go OVER .500.

That would be a really weird feeling.

Game starts at 7 on Fox Sports North

Kevin Love has been suspended for two games by the NBA.

Apparently, I’m just a giant homer.

From ESPN:

Minnesota Timberwolves forward Kevin Love has been suspended for two games for stomping on Rockets forward Luis Scola’s face in their game on Saturday.

The NBA announced the suspension Monday.

On the one hand, I can’t say I’m surprised. The NBA makes a pretty obvious effort to prevent players from fighting, cursing or doing anything that might further brand the league, as ignorant online commenters like to say, “a group of thugs.” Stepping on another human being seems to qualify under the category of “thuggish.”

That being said, I’m still not convinced Love did it intentionally. I think A Wolf Among Wolves actually had the best description of the actions: he didn’t try NOT to. Apparently, that’s good enough for the NBA, who robbed the Timberwolves of Love’s services for the next two games.

The good news is that Minnesota’s next game, the first one Love will miss, is against the Sacramento Kings. The bad news is that the next one is the next night against Memphis in Memphis.

Hey Beas/D-Will? If you were looking for a chance to show your worth, it’s now.

Minnesota's new double double machine

I’ve heard talk of the Timberwolves in the playoffs, but let’s put that idea on hold for a while and instead, let’s discuss the more pertinent optimism.

The Minnesota Timberwolves are 24 games into the season (over a third of the games have been played already…time flies on a compressed schedule!), and they are a .500 team.

It didn’t come easily, this watermark of mediocrity. Starting off the season against Oklahoma City, the Wolves were essentially assured of an uphill battle back to the middle. They lost to Milwaukee, which would have made them 1-1. They lost to Memphis, missing 3-3. A loss to Utah prevented 8-8. They couldn’t reach 10-10 against the Lakers. The Pacers prevented 11-11.

Several sites, perhaps discounting the Milwaukee loss as too early in the season, have incorrectly said that Minnesota had four opportunities before tonight to get back to .500, but in reality, tonight was the sixth attempt.

Maybe all the pomp and circumstance from writers is what made it difficult for the Wolves to get here. Maybe it’s tough to focus on the game at hand when everyone wants to talk about what winning the game would mean. Maybe every writer has been like me and spent five paragraphs talking about getting back to .500 without mentioning a thing about a big home win for the Timberwolves. (*Ahem*)

The teams were predictably chippy tonight, playing for the third time in three weeks. The fans started by booing Kevin McHale. Then they booed Luis Scola. And Kyle Lowry. Then, later, Luis Scola again for having the audacity to put his face right where Kevin Love’s foot was supposed to be.

Fortunately, once all the dust settled, there was still a game to be finished.

Minnesota’s first half was everything we enjoy watching from this team. They were sharing the ball well, hitting mid-range shots, and playing energetic defense. There was a really nice alley-oop from Rubio to Wes Johnson, which has become such a staple in most Wolves games.

Adelman made a really interesting defensive adjustment, allowing Wes to guard Kevin Martin and putting Ridnour on Chandler Parsons. It was absolutely the right call, despite the obvious mis-match potential of Ridnour vs Parsons. Wes bothered Martin and took him completely out of rhythm, forcing Martin into 1-10 shooting. Parsons struggled against Ridnour. He seemed to feel the pressure to perform with the smaller Ridnour guarding him, whacking away at the ball whenever Parsons brought it down low. The aggressive defense disturbed Parsons, and he missed a ton of shots, never really seeming to get comfortable. If a defensive strategy can prevent an All-Star from beating you, role players are going to have a much harder time doing so. Adelman gambled on it and he won. Smart man.

Houston threatened the Wolves in the fourth, getting the lead all the way down to three before two plays sealed things for the Wolves. First, with Minnesota up by just five and 4:22 left in the game, Ridnour missed a three, but Pekovic got the offensive rebound. Barea cut around his man and found Ridnour open in the corner…the crack in Houston’s zone defense. Ridnour swished the three, and put the Wolves up by eight.

Then, just two possessions later, with the Wolves up six, Love drained a contested three, giving the Wolves a much-needed nine point lead. Rubio drove to the lane a couple plays later, icing the game with a layup.

This game is, boiled down, just another win for the Wolves. They are .500. They have won half and lost half of their games.

But as of right now, the Rockets are 9th in the West. And here’s my last thought: you will be hard pressed to convince me that the Wolves, at full strength, aren’t plain and simply better than Houston. In their first matchup, Minnesota was missing several key players. As the necessary pieces started to return, the Wolves won the next two. Minnesota may or may not be a playoff team. But they are pretty good.

At very least, they aren’t losers now.

At this point, you have probably heard that Kevin Love stepped on Luis Scola Saturday night. Here’s a video:

I don’t think Love meant to step on Scola’s face, so I’m in complete disagreement with the announcers in this very biased video. It looked to me as though he was trying to step over him and sort of fell forward. If he had meant to step on his face, he would have done it with his foot, not his shin, right? If anything, Love tried to step on his chest.

That being said, I don’t think Love is at ALL sorry he did it.

Further, the officials let that entire situation get WAY out of hand. First, they let the Rockets hang all over Love on one end, frustrating Love inordinately. Then they let Love get away with a blatant frustration foul on the other end, sending Scola crashing to the floor. Was Love’s action not called a foul as some sort of make-up non-call? Because for an NBA official, that’s despicable. Love fouled him and the violation needed to be called. Would they have gotten booed? OF COURSE. It’s their job as officials to make calls like that and take the abuse that would have rained down on them. Then, to cap off this whole fiasco, they called a ticky-tack foul on the Rockets on the other end, which completely threw the situation out of whack (”alright, Love and Scola assaulting each other? No foul…just DON’T YOU TOUCH RIDNOUR!”) before calling a technical on the Rockets bench who were complaining about what had happened on the other end. Mind you, nobody from the Rockets bench stood up or anything. Apparently, they were just complaining too loudly.

It was one of the worst officiating sequences I have seen in a long time. I’ll be surprised if Love gets suspended, but if he does I’m blaming the bad officiating for about 40% of it. (Love gets the other 60%…control your temper and don’t throw Luis Scola to the ground next time.)

And really, that’s what this situation boils down to. This isn’t a case where some deep, violent inner tendency of Kevin Love has come to the surface. It’s a case where he did something stupid, in the heat of the moment battling against Scola. It’s hard to say whether or not it was intentional, and I’m glad it’s not my job to sort out the wreckage.

Back to our regular scheduled programming…the Wolves are back to .500! MUCH more on that tomorrow, with minimal references to this incident. I promise.

USE THE FORCE, KYLE LOWRY!

Last game: Minnesota: W, 108-105 vs New Jersey, Houston: 99-81 vs Phoenix

The Timberwolves fought through a tough game last night on the road against the Nets, allowing essentially everything ever to go wrong, but still managing to leave with a win. Anthony Morrow hit (approximately) 150 three-pointers, but Nikola Pekovic scored a career-high 27 points for the Wolves, who improved to 11-12 on the season.

The Rockets snapped a two game losing streak last night against the Suns, winning easily in Houston. The bench scored 50 points, and the Rockets weren’t seriously threatened after taking a 20 point half-time lead. Kevin Martin led Rockets scorers with 17.

The Key Questions

#1. Seriously, we have to play these guys again?

Three times in two weeks. At least we can expect both teams to be well scouted. Just as a reminder: in the first meeting, Kevin Martin absolutely torched the Wolves and Houston handled Minnesota easily, 107-92 at the Target Center. But earlier this week, the Wolves handed the Rockets just their third loss at home, 120-108. Michael Beasley had his best game of the year thus far, scoring 34 points on 10-14 shooting. So basically, one can expect to have absolutely no idea what’s going to happen tonight.

#2. What will we get from Pekovic tonight?

Pek has been playing great lately. His advantages offensively over Darko are striking. He is incredibly strong and he uses his huge body to get closer to the basket. Plus, unlike Darko, he actually has touch around the rim. It’s difficult to predict what Adelman will do on a night to night basis lineup-wise, but it’s not hard to imagine Pekovic getting a start tonight based on his performance over the past week.

#3. Why has .500 become such an elusive goal?

Yet another chance for Minnesota to get to .500 tonight. It would be the latest in the season they reached that mark since the KG-era. I don’t know what that means, but it feels quite significant.

The Key Matchups

Kevin Love has played really well against the Rockets, scoring 29 and 39 in the last two games. Luis Scola has scored 15 and 8 in those games, so outplaying Scola will be important for Love.

The Ricky Rubio vs. Kyle Lowry match-up has been interesting. Last week Rubio made several costly turnovers that enabled Houston to go on a huge run to put away the Wolves, while Lowry scored 16 points and dished out 10 assists. But on Monday, Rubio flirted with a triple double (18 points, 11 assists, 8 rebounds) while Lowry had just 11 points and 3 assists. It seems fair to say that whoever plays better will put his team in a good position to win.

The Rockets don’t have anyone who matches up well against Michael Beasley. If Beasley plays smart, efficient basketball again tonight, there’s no reason he can’t have a good follow up performance to his last game against Houston. Also, if I win the lottery, there’s no reason I can’t be rich tomorrow.

The Outlook

Both teams played last night, both teams had some serious travel to get here, and both teams have been playing well lately, so the game should be very close. I honestly don’t have a prediction for this one, but I’ll be at the game tonight and I’ll be tweeting about it quite a bit, so (shameless self-plug) follow me!

Game starts at 7 on League Pass

Is Pek's production unsustainable?

Some wins look bad on paper.

Beating New Jersey by just three points is one of those wins. I wasn’t able to watch the game live, so following it on my phone, I was really discouraged seeing the Nets continue to fight back whenever it felt like Minnesota was about to put them away. The Timberwolves went on an 11-0 run in the second quarter and a 12-0 run in the third, and both times they failed to administer anything resembling a killing blow.

But watching the replay on League Pass, I was more encouraged. Maybe it was just the sweet pass from Rubio to Wes Johnson, maybe it was Pekovic suddenly turning into mid-90s Hakeem Olajuwon, I’m not sure. But here’s a short list of the things that Minnesota weathered to come away with their 11th win of the season:

• Anthony Morrow: Destroyer of Worlds. Morrow scored a career high 42 points.
• Wes Johnson fouling Morrow: Destroyer of Worlds on a three point attempt that gave the Nets a four point play and brought the game within one.
• A mediocre night from Kevin Love. (He had a 20-10 double double, but needed 16 shots to do it and was bullied by Kris Humphries all night.)
• 15-46 shooting from the starters.
• A road game on the East Coast (despite a startling number of Rubio fans…is he creating road fanboys?)
• 16 turnovers as a team.
• An obnoxious fan who looked a little like The Situation jumping around on the sideline. I’m just impressed nobody punched him.
• Deron Williams vs Ricky Rubio.

Somehow, despite all that, Minnesota pulled out a gutsy victory. New Jersey is not a good basketball team this year. But if a team has Deron Williams and a player who drops 42 points, they are a good team for the night. So how did they pull this one out?

One very big man putting together a very big statline: Nikola Pekovic.

Sometimes when a player scores a ton of points, it’s really difficult to imagine him ever scoring that many again.

For example: Michael Beasley against Houston on Monday. Will he score that many points again at some point? Probably. But 34 points on 10-14 shooting? 2-3 from behind the arc? Probably not going to continue. He demonstrated some really positive signs, posting up more often and working to get to the basket, but Beasley’s long twos historically don’t continue to fall the way they did against Houston.

Friday night’s performance by Nikola Pekovic is a little more intriguing. Pek scored a career high 27 points against the Nets in 34 minutes off the bench. He shot 11-14 from the floor and even contributed a huge assist, finding Ridnour open in the corner for a late three.

Take a look at Pekovic’s shot chart for a second. The thought that has been bouncing around in my head (and tripping me out) since last night is this: none of those shots are unsustainable. They were all easy layups or shots close to the rim, created either by a series of nice post moves that utilize his strength, or beautiful passes from Rubio. That’s the big difference between Pekovic and Darko: Pek catches Rubio’s passes and finishes them with ease. Darko lets them bounce of his fingers out of bounds.

And yeah, I know that Pek will struggle when matched up against taller, longer defenders. But there are going to be very few players who can match his strength. While expecting 27 points per game is completely unreasonable, I honestly believe that he can develop into a productive center for Minnesota.

That roughly covers last night’s game. It didn’t always look pretty but Minnesota needed a win and they got it.

Tonight, they go for .500 again. Much more coming soon.

The Minnesota Muskies jerseys were classic. The Muskies' play? Not so much.

Who would’ve thought that a tiff between Danny Granger and Kevin Love would be a huge swinging point in what was supposed to be a tight game? And who would’ve thought that swing was in the favor of the road team?

Usually those kinds of moments swing momentum in the home team’s favor but that was the biggest difference in tonight’s loss to the Indiana Pacers. The Wolves lost 109-99 to a very good Pacers team led by Granger’s big second half.

Granger proved tonight, at least to me, that he is a #1 option for a good team like the Pacers. Granger couldn’t miss a shot in the third and fourth quarters, which just so happened to come after he shoved Love after a lose ball foul.

Love swung his paw down hard over the top of Granger on a lose rebound. Granger didn’t take a liking to it and shoved right back with some words for Love and the rest of the Muskies. Shoving commenced and both sides had to be seperated by the referees. From that point on the chippiness was at an all-time high. Whistles were ringing from all around the court, which seemed to throw off the Wolves’ focus. But not Granger’s. No, Granger took advantage of that moment, where he received a technical, and lit up the Target Center up until the final buzzer.

Granger’s big night was just ridiculous. Part of it was due to poor on-ball defense from Wes Johnson and Martell Webster but most of it was just Granger being on fire. 29 of his 36 points came in the second half, including five dagger-like three pointers.

The Timberwolves — donning Hardwood Classics featuring the ABA Minnesota Muskies jerseys from 1966-1967 season — were unable to answer Granger’s play all night long. Love, who I thought was going to rejuvenate this team after his tussle, never got much cooking in the second half. His three-point stroke wasn’t working tonight, which disappointingly seems to throw off his entire offensive repertoire. And without Love hitting outside shots, Ricky Rubio’s outside options are nearly exhausted. Instead, he was forced to go through other options, such as Michael Beasley and Nikola Pekovic, who couldn’t muster up enough to match Granger’s play.

Let’s finish with some bullets:

• The Wolves’ defense was bad tonight. That patented scrappiness we’ve come to love this season wasn’t there, and when it was, it just turned into boneheaded fouls. As mentioned earlier, Johnson and Webster struggled to cover Granger all game long. Even point guard Darren Collison was using his speed to blaze by Rubio and company; it was the first time I noticed Rubio completely overmatched on the defensive end; he didn’t even register a single steal tonight, the tell tale sign that the defense just isn’t clicking or nearly as active.
• Darko Milicic officially made his bid to be Pekovic’s backup for good tonight. He went 2-9 in just 18 minutes. But those seven missed shots are way worse than you can imagine; just the ugliest, flat hook shots I’ve ever witnessed. And again, there were multiple dunk opportunities that he bypassed for a hook/layup looking shot. Just not a good game for the good guy and it may be time for him to take a permanent seat. His defensive prowess is still needed in specific matchups but he can be better utilized from the bench.
• Speaking of bench players, JJ Barea made his return tonight and it could’ve come later. Barea’s first stint on the floor after returning from injury was rough; he went 0-4 and was stalemated by the oversized Pacers’ frontcourt. Even his second stint, where his shooting and points increased, he still struggled to squeak through lanes inside. Indiana was just too big, way too big.
• Beasley followed up his 34-point night in Houston with an 11-point dud. Remember how in Houston he worked for his shots? Well, he tried to get those same looks without trying for them. It might not make sense but just check the box score and you’ll know what I mean. I did, however, enjoy seeing him get back to the free throw line. More of that, please.
• Going back to the starting center saga, check these numbers: Pekovic recorded his second double-double in the last five games. He’s also scored in double-digits in four of those five tilts. ‘Nuff said.
• The Wolves hit only three of 17 three-pointers. The Wolves had 16 turnovers. The Wolves missed nine free throws. This game should’ve been much closer between two very well matched teams but the Wolves didn’t show up with their best effort.
• To sum it all up, this was a tough loss indeed but I’m thankful it came to a really good team. The Indiana Pacers will challenge some of the East’s best like Miami and Chicago, especially if Granger can pull his weight like he did tonight. The Pacers have a deep bench and one of the most complete rosters I’ve seen in the NBA. I expect big things to keep comin’ from Indiana. Way to go, Larry; GM of the year, indeed.

The Wolves go to New Jersey Friday night. Hopefully they don’t have Dwight Howard by then, although a Pek-Superman matchup would be pretty special to watch. Definitely another winnable road game that could give the Wolves some momentum moving forward into an easier schedule over the next few games.