Locked On Wolves POSTCAST: Minnesota Timberwolves take down Golden State Warriors

Locked On Wolves POSTCAST: Minnesota Timberwolves take down Golden State Warriors

Hello and welcome into the lockdown wolves postcast part of the lockdown podcast Network I’m live following the Wolves comeback win over the Golden State war is rapid reaction to the Wolves win coming up Next you are locked on wolves postcast part of locked on Minnesota on the locked on podcast Network your team every day hello and welcome in to the lock wolves postcast part of the lockd on podcast Network your team every day my name is Ben Beacon I’m the host of The

Daily lock on wolves podcast flying solo today on the postcast Luke’s out tonight Jack’s out tonight Jack’s actually covering the game for Kana sua so holding it down this is going to be a quick hitter probably about a 12 minute postcast with some rapid reaction thoughts following the game and uh then

We’ll have the full lock on wolves podcast of course early Monday morning that’ll be a full 30-minute show with some expanded thoughts on some of these quick hit thought so let’s Jump Right In Here uh to talk about the Wolves win over the Warriors and like I said

There’s a lot to get to um and let’s start with the finish the Timberwolves well actually let let’s do this let’s set up what led to the finish the Wolves trailed by eight at halftime they had a miserable start to this game offensively we’ll talk a little bit more about that

Here in a minute and then they built a lead as big as eight in the second half mostly on the backs of the bench the tiber’s bench was awesome in the third quarter and really the start of the fourth quarter Minnesota trailed by three to start the final the final final

Period of the game and then led by as many as eight early in the fourth led by five when Anthony Edwards and Oz Reed came back in the game a little past the Midway point in the fourth quarter but the Warriors of course aren’t going to

Go away Golden State’s played a lot of close games this year it’s obviously a veteran team well a mix of a very a very veteran team mixed with some very young players and while the olls did a pretty good job for most of the game against

You know the the the Steph Curry’s and the um the Klay Thompsons for the most part those guys weren’t super efficient scoring the basketball uh they hit big shots late and the Timberwolves defense there were a couple possessions they were just a half step slow and then offensively the Wolves did enough to

Kind of counterpunch down the stretch um what it came down to it though this was just a five-point game with a little over a minute to play I’m gonna see if I can pull the exact time stamp here um it was a fivepoint game with I guess it was a little over two

Minutes where was the ant there was a bad ant Miss three in there when the Wolves needed to have a better possession and this is is I don’t usually do this show Live Here solo so there we go they’re up three with 30 seconds left here we go they’re up three

With about 30 seconds left after curry made a couple of free throws that was after the goar shooting foul the Wolves had a couple of really strong defensive possessions when they were up five um and Steph Curry ends up getting to the basket after the Wolves had knocked the

Ball out of bounds after an offensive rebound by Golden State and they come down up three and ant jacks up a contested pull-up Jumper in the half court with just over 20 seconds to play misses it and then Steph Curry gets the rebound and goes the length of the floor

In 5 seconds and scores with hardly any resistance the the pro there oh like seeing it live it obviously wasn’t great to to not slow down Steph Curry going sprinting full court uh in a three-point game with 20 seconds left less than 20 seconds but the pro is that Jaden did

Not commit a foul and allow Steph to tie the game right there with a three-point play but it was still no resistance Jaden essentially stayed on Steph’s hip all the way down the court after an ill-advised ant shot besides that I actually thought the Wolves end of game

Execution was really good and that’s obviously an area they’ve struggled in mightily at times this season but besides that possession I thought both ends of the floor as even defensively or I should say especially defensively in the final few minutes of this game The Wolves were really really good and then

It was just kind of the free throw game at that point and of course made the two big ones and then uh the Warriors got a pretty good look from Klay Thompson they ran a flare screen um and the Wolves switched it Kyle Anderson was on the

Shooting hand of Klay Thompson from the left wing just above the slot um and but it was a pretty good look from clay he just missed it wide right and and the Wolves ended up holding on to win but I thought it was a pretty strong close for Minnesota given everything that else

That had happened during the game and given how you know they trailed basically the whole game until they had this this big third quarter run um early let’s back up what some of the problems were early that led to this led to this big deficit Minnesota only scored 18

Points in the first quarter and it was it was you the Ws had some rough offensive quarters especially well really not especially recently all year I mean the offense I talked about this on lockdown wolves a couple times last week the Wolves offense since the cat

Injury is roughly the same as it was before the cat injury at least in terms of results right they’re still around middle of the pack in the league lower middle of the pack you know uh you know the 18 to 20 Range League wide in terms of offensive rating postcat injury which

Is where they’ve been all season but this was a really rough first quarter for whatever reason the Wolves felt like it was necessary to try and force the ball into Rudy Gober or in the game and they they did this a lot last year um

They did it a little early this year it was just kind of a weird like hey we have the size Advantage clearly the game plan was like let’s punish them in the paint let’s take advantage they don’t have size right like I mean kaminga is the biggest guy out there most of the

Time for them and I understand it in theory um but golden state is Savvy enough defensively and they’ve got enough guys that can jump passing Lanes Etc and the Wolves were just not I mean they were just sloppy with the basketball early in this game The Wolves

Had I think eight turnovers in the first like seven or eight minutes finished the quarter with nine turnovers and for the game they still had too many they had 15 for the game but nine of the 15 were in the first quarter they only committed six turnovers over the final 36 minutes

Of the game which is still not great I mean it’s okay I guess that rate is is fine but to have nine turnovers in the first quarter and still only Trail by nine points coming out of the first quarter was huge a big part of that was

Nas Reed Nas was awesome early in this game uh he certainly uh you know he’s what kept the wolves in this thing early on um and that was that was massive um he’s what kept the offense rolling he I think had five made threes before halftime um a and you know other than

Forcing the ball to Rudy there just generally wasn’t a whole lot of offensive flow period but Nas was still awesome I want to get into some of the second half stuff here in a second first let’s talk about our friends over at Robin Hood did you know that even if you

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Into the early fourth quarter the Wolves were down at Halftime by 8 and um the start of the third quarter really that’s when things started to flip but when things really started to take off for Minnesota was the start of the fourth quarter down three with no

Anthony Edwards and no Nas Reed on the floor for Minnesota and and I thought it was a gutsy call by Chris Finch to I know ant doesn’t ever play at the start of the fourth that’s his rest period right they try and get him five to seven

Minutes of rest to start the fourth quarter because he plays all the first quarter he plays all the third quarter that’s the substitution pattern that Finch does um but to also not have Nas out there I was a little worried about that to be honest in a game where the

Wolves had struggled to score period And I know Nas didn’t have a massive third quarter but he was the offense in the first half of this game and had a big second quarter I guess big is relative relatively speaking um but it was I was worried about it but instead the timber

Got great ball movement early in the in the fourth quarter of this game um and it was a lot of n Alexander Walker it was a lot of Monte Morris on both ends of the floor Monte was awesome on both ends uh early in the fourth quarter

Especially you look at the box score and it doesn’t leap out like if you didn’t watch the game You’ like all right nice backup point guard minutes eight points couple of made threes for Monte you know whatever he only played 17 minutes mlin only played 12 minutes Monte Morris was

Huge in this game he had a really strong fourth quarter stretch especially eight points overall for the game three assists like I said two made threes a block in this game and no turnovers in 17 minutes for Monte Morris he was really good defensively one my notes was

He had a couple strong possessions against Chris Paul where he was just physical enough with him to try and get him off his spot offensively and it worked out nikel alander Walker had a like a typically strong stretch for him um each of them made threes immediately

In the fourth quarter each each of them made one and again they were both really good defensively too um and then from there you know Mike Conley took over some of the scoring until ant came back in the game at about the six and a half minute Mark Conley had a nice stretch

There in the fourth quarter too but credit to a couple guys who again it doesn’t jump off the stat sheet but Monte Morris and N Alexander Walker uh nil’s numbers for this game 11 points three made threes I believe all of them were in the second half uh four of seven

Shooting three of five from outside the arc two assists for Nelle and he was a plus 12 which you know take tons of grains of salt with individual player single game plus minus I always say that on the show but he was a plus 12 in 22

Minutes in this game and um it was apparent the impact he had and also just like some of those lineups where Kyle Anderson is effectively running the offense and Mike Conley and Alexander Walker and in some cases Monte Morris and in some cases recently Jordan mlin

Have been asked to just kind of shoot and slowmo kind of hangs out in the middle and and just kind of picks guys off like finds guys to pass to on the perimeter when the wolves are shooting the three as well as they have recently

That’s going to work and uh by the way the Wolves shot over 50% from three in this game they were 21 of 40 you should win a lot of games when you shoot when you make 21 threes you’re 52 2 and half% from three but the Wolves only won this

One by four I want to talk about a couple of other categories the Wolves didn’t do great and we’ll get to that here next and that’s how we’ll close the postcast today let’s talk about our friends over at prize pick prize pick is America’s number one fantasy sports app

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It’s that easy all right let’s close it out with just talking a little bit about some of the issues that the Wolves had we talked already about the first quarter issues um but I want to talk about the um about some of the issues I guess throughout the game for the wolves

Um The Wolves obviously have a size advantage against against the words and I talked about how the Wolves struggled early when they tried to Force the ball into goar and goar ended up having a really impactful game um and points of the paint wise like Golden State’s a

Team that you should be able to dominate the paint against and the Wolves did okay there right like uh it was actually dead even 36 a piece points in the paint um The Wolves won the rebounding battle by just three rebounds in this game which again size Advantage you should

Win it by even more and Nas was huge in that in that regard in this game um he ended up with 20 and 12 rebounds 20 points 12 rebounds so yeah the Wolves bigs ended up having nice stat but early on the defense was fine but the Wolves didn’t do much offensively in

The paint because they were so worried about forcing the ball into Rudy and crit Golden State for the way that they defended Anthony Edwards too by the way with the way they loaded up on Ant and ant had a couple of really impressive possessions where uh there was one that

He hit um I think it was McDaniels for a left corner three it was McDaniels in the first half second quarter ant Drew three Defenders on the right side of the paint and Skip past it instead of kicking it back you know the easy next pass he went two passes away to the

Opposite corner for an open three for McDaniels there were a couple of passes like that in this game from Ant um and he had eight assists to two turnovers so that was really a positive thing um turnovers like that was the biggest problem in this game obviously that was

Somewhat uh mitigated by the amount of Threes the wolves made free throw attempts the Wolves shot eight less free throws in this game uh than Golden State and there’s been some games recently where I’ve I’ve said like hey that’s because the other team was the aggressor the Wolves were not the aggressors you

Know it’s it’s the Wolves fault they didn’t shoot more free throws for the most part I didn’t feel that way about this game I didn’t feel like the Wolves got a good whistle at all for Anthony Edwards to attempt 10 two-point field goals and only get to the line and

That’s or I’m sorry yeah 10 two-point field goals and only shoot eight free throws um and obviously when he’s fouled and doesn’t make the shot it doesn’t count as a field goal on the stat sheet right so he attempted more than that and he only got to the line uh four times

For a total of eight free throws he deserved a better whistle in this game Rudy probably deserved more than three free throws in this game but it was mostly ant um I I was not a fan of how the game was officiated I don’t say that very often if you’re regular listener to

Lock down wolves you know that that’s the case but I thought the Wolves should have gotten more free throw attempts um so that that hurt as well and I wanted them to do better in the paint but again good game plan from Golden State and the

Wolves did enough late in this game to win the execution down the stretch save for that you know I guess last real halfcourt possession for Minnesota offense I thought they did a really good job uh down the stretch all right my big takeaways for this one real quick here to close it out

Um then more on the show on Monday um good overall execution down the stretch after the comeback uh the Wolves offense was sloppy early Nas kept them in it and once they got away from trying to force it to Rudy there was better ball movement which then led to that early

Fourth quarter no um no NS on the floor no ants on the floor but Nik Alexander Walker uh Mike connley uh Monte Morris were huge from Minnesota in the fourth quarter and uh overall they did just enough in a lot of areas on the glass for instance oh the

One other area real quick that I wanted to hit on was transition the Wolves I wanted the Wolves to do a little bit more in transition Golden State’s a team the Wolves could run on they ended up winning fast break points by four um but something I’ve talked about recently a

Lot on lockdown wolves on The Daily Show is that uh the Wolves need to run more they’re the League’s best most efficient transition team but they run the second least last I looked they were 29th in in overall Pace according to cleaning the glass but they were first in efficiency

In fast break that needs to go up and it has gone up a little without Carl towns mostly because it’s not because cat holds them back but it’s because he does a little because K you know other than Trail threes he isn’t super effective in transition he doesn’t get back great in

Transition either because he falls down a lot Etc um but the Wolves just need to play higher variance basketball overall they need to get more offensive possessions now in this game they were good enough in the half court save for that ugly first quarter that didn’t matter as much

But for them to take opportunities against teams they can run against even though the Wolves for the season are slower paced team they can play fast they have the Personnel to play Fast depending on opponent I think they need to take advantage of that all right

That’s all I have for the postcast I’m going to do a full show which will be longer than this one on Monday I’m going to expand on a few of these topics especially the transition stuff a little bit more so if you’re not a regular listener to lockon wolves uh you’ll be

Able to hear this audio over there you always can catch the lockon Wolves postcast audio on the lockon Wolves audio feed after you see it on YouTube but we have a daily Monday through Friday show over at lockdown wolves that I host I will have a show early Monday

It’ll be the postgame pod we’ll talk all about this game and then daily throughout the week the Wolves only have a couple games this week so lots of bigger picture topics we’ll talk a lot more about wolves offense and defense postcat injuries so lots to get to the

Next postcast will be after the next Wolves game of course which is um I’m gonna pull it up real quick because I’m blinking on what it actually is it is on Wednesday against the Pistons is that right Wednesday yeah Wednesday against the Pistons at home as the Wolves close

Out the home standand so we will have a live post on lockdown Sports Minnesota on YouTube as we always do and again subscribe to lockdown wolves wherever you like to listen to podcast uh that’s all I have for you here on the postcast a big thank you for tuning in Live on

YouTube or for listening after the fact and we’ll catch you next time

The Minnesota Timberwolves staged a second-half comeback to defeat the Golden State Warriors. Ben Beecken (@bbeecken) has the immediate reaction following the game.

#minnesotatimberwolves #wolves #anthonyedwards #karlanthonytowns #mikeconley #RudyGobert

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