After thirteen straight losses, the Minnesota Timberwolves have won four straight and six of their last eight games. Yes, they’re beating mostly non-playoff teams in this stretch but you have to somehow believe that this team is actually growing and getting better. Thanks to Randy Foye and Al Jefferson, the Wolves are the hottest team in the NBA now.
What’s up with this team?
1. They’re playing with confidence
“Probably confidence, I would say,” McHale said after the Wolves ran their winning streak to four games Wednesday night with a resounding 129-87 victory over the Oklahoma City Thunder. “They’re confident. They’re feeling good about playing basketball.”
They’re shooting the ball well and they’re running mainly because of Telfair manning the point. This guy has been inconsistent but he can run a fast break. In their last 8 games, the Wolves have averaged close to 108 points a game. This is up from 94 a game in their first 27 games.
2. Better spacing
The Wolves always had problems with their spacing in their half court set. This was mainly caused by Randy Foye running the point but now that he’s playing off guard, it looks like this problem has been fixed. One more reason that they’re being able to solve this problem is that they’re running more and they’re letting Brian Cardinal play. What? Who?? Yup, Cardinal, for me, is just an intelligent player. He is also a good defender but the best thing is that he knows where to position himself on offense. He doesn’t get into the driving lanes of his teammates and creates enough space so he could also be a threat from outside.
3. Foye is on fire
In their four straight wins, Randy Foye is averaging 23.25 points a game up from his season average of 15. He is also averaging 3.25 threes and is shooting 54% from the field. Keep this up and Wolves fans can forget about almost landing shooting guard OJ Mayo in that draft day swap between Mayo-Love(w/Mike Miller). They should be happy with Foye.
4. A change in the lineup
Speaking of shooting guard, Foye has been starting as their shooting guard in their past nine games and they’ve won six of them. The Foye experiment at point guard obviously didn’t work as he looks more comfortable as a scorer and playing off the ball. Sebastian Telfair looks to be the point guard in the near future and has looked effective. Mike Miller, who has had ankle problems of late, has been coming off the bench. This has been going well for the Wolves as Mike Miller is already familiar with this role having won the sixth man of the year before.
5. Steady improvement of Gomes and Love
In their last four games, Kevin Love has found a way to get his rebounds and score at an efficient way. His overall fg% is up because of his 58% shooting in those four wins and he has averaged 12.25 points and 10.5 rebounds. This is a much better performance compared with games where he went 0-7, 0-4 and so on. As for Gomes, he has been very consistent scoring the ball as of late especially with his threes. The best part of his game is he is one Minnesota’s best defenders.
6. Who could forget Al Jeff?
It’s just great to see the Wolves winning as Big Al has just been working hard the past two years. He has just been a consistent player and he has been racking up 4 straight double doubles. This trend could continue as they’re up against the Bucks, Heat, Suns and the Clippers in their next 4. Al Jeff somehow just play well when he’s against the Suns.
7. Mc-Cants be found
In their last four wins, Rashad McCants has played a total of 13:41 and has had two DNP-CD. This could be a good thing for the Wolves. Though he is a good offensive player, he sometimes lacks the energy in games. His role coming off the bench has been given to Mike Miller and some of his minutes have been given to Rodney Carney.
“I thought Rashad played well when he played,” McHale said. “You can’t play everybody. His time will come again. You’ve got to practice hard, put your nose to the grindstone and make it happen for yourself.”
Maybe this guy is just distracted.
