Wolves vs Nuggets 5/12/24 7PM Wolves lead 2-1

[life_saver]

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[Shaka_Zulu]

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Straight up depressing. How do you lose the 2 minutes 40 seconds he sat by 13? Wtf?

[Loaf_of_bread]

Freaking Kat needs to step it up

[cmoss84]

True heavyweight match. We kicked ass rounds 1-2. Denver won desperate rd 3. Shot lights out rd 4.
Ladies and gentlemen...we have a NEW 3 game series on our hands. Winner take all.

[Calinks]

Can't we believe we blew most of our trade assets on this **** center. Clint Capela would have been better tonight. Isiah Hartenstein would have been better. Embarrassing.

Settle down. Its easy to be emotional in gut wrenching loss like this. But no need to go overboard. And forget the stellar season up to this point.


He had an awful game, but that was it is, a single game.

I knew Minnesota fans would go into meltdown mode if things got tough. I wont sugar coat it, things are bad. Denver could have won one of these games but to drop two? That's lethal. I didn't pick us to win this series but the first two games really opened my eyes to what we are capable of right now.

Things are grim but the series is essentially reset. We haven't lost any players, we still have the same team that played those first two games. Denver is operating at peak level right now, we have to come up and match it. If we don't we lose to the better team, period. That sucks but I can live with that. Every game just helps inform this team on what they need to do to be better in the future. This is an education.

[karch34]

This version of Nuggets has taken their lumps. We are taking them now. We accelerated Ant’s development and he’s responded which is a huge positive. But end of day we don’t have the firepower to stop an elite offense when the D isn’t clicking. Towns should be the ideal compliment to Ant but he needs to bring it every night. 5-18 was maybe tolerable during Butler Ball. Not now.

[Note30]

Tonight the best team wins. We can’t put this one on the refs ( 27 FT for us, 15 FT for Denver…). We were not good in defense at allow way too much open 3.

Our bench was totally dominated by Denver bench which is really a disappointment.
If we look at our players :

- ANT was MVP level, he did all he could to keep the team alive but it was not enough. Another impressive performance from 22 years guys.
- Mike was quite good ( 15 pts,9 Assists, 0 TO) is what you can expected.
- Rudy came alive on second half but his defense was not really good and his weakness on the perimeter were obvious tonight.
- Jaden is so inconsistent on offense. And when his defense is not at his best, he become a really average player. But he is young and will learn from this series.
- KAT : One more time, a real disappointment at PO. Miss too many shoot and did not impact the game in any way. For a self proclaimed best 7’’ 3 points shooter in the world, it was not enough. Considering our much money he make, we should consider a trade for him as I doubt he improve more at his career stage.
- Naz was okay, not at this best but at least he hit some shoot.
- NAW is still very inconsistent ( cf comment on Jaden)
- SLomo : Probably the last 2 games he will play with the Wolves, he is a nice guy but is so down this year.
Overall, we see tonight what is missing to become a real contender. Denver will win the series and probably the title. Being able to dominated us with Porter, KCP as non factor, Murray just average show how strong they are and how experiences and having good bench players matters in PO.

We should consider trading Rudy way before KAT. He's a non factor.

KAT didn't play well cause he had to guard their best player all night. Rudy let Gordon score 30 pts. Who TF even is Aaron Gordon.

I agree but the return we can get from Rudy will probably be far away the one we can get from KAT. Both have been extremely disapointing so far.

Anger and bitterness.

[Note30]

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Straight up depressing. How do you lose the 2 minutes 40 seconds he sat by 13? Wtf?

We have no backup playmaker. Nobody who can get buckets as a guard.

It's just Ant. Give me CJ McCollum, give me Austin Reaves, give me Andrew Nembhard, give me someone who can get a damn bucket and handle the ball.

We need what Andre Igoudala was for the warriors.

I thought NAW could be that guy and that's why I turned around during the first round but that's way too much pressure to put on a guy who was almost out of the league two seasons ago.

[younggunsmn]

It's an absolute damn shame we wasted a performance like that from Ant tonight, he was electric on both ends of the court and left everything on the court tonight.

None of his teammates picked him up.
Jaden and Mike were OK but not great.

NAW was brutally awful.
Kyle was -18 in 6 minutes and if that doesn't give the coaching staff a wake up call that a backup PG needs to be taking his minutes, even if that's J-Mac, I don't know what will.

But the real story of this series is that Jokic and Gordon are absolutely destroying Towns and Gobert.
26/38 from the field tonight.
Gobert is too light in the behind to guard Jokic straight up, he just walks him down into the paint and shoots a 5 footer over him.
Towns gives a little more resistance but gets absolutely lost on help defense.

And KAT was an absolute sh*tshow on offense, he lost us the game in the first half.
Rudy was also terrible with 5 turnovers to 5 FGA and 4 FT misses, but at least he was getting other players buckets by setting screens.

Aaron Gordon is the MVP of this series for them so far and is doing exactly what he is supposed to be doing, and if we keep treating him like he is Mark effing Madsen, we will continue to lose.
Denver smartly just keeps putting KAT and Rudy on skates out there and reading and then attacking their overplays.
The same damn thing we should be doing to Jokic who is not a guy who ever contests hard at the rim.

We're not playing much like a team that trusts their teammates to defend their matchup one on one right now, and it's turning into a lot of really really bad defense.

Naz is the only one who really gives Jokic any resistance at all.

That thumping we gave them in Denver woke them the Eff up, and if we can't beat them at home with a performance like this from Ant, I don't know that we can win another one.
Maybe if KAT misses the plane to Denver somehow.

And a serious EFF YOU to the league for giving us Tony Brothers and Scott Foster for our two games at home.
You want the fans to think somehow you're better than pro wrestling and you send in the two biggest clowns everyone and their mother knows you use to rig games to extend series and milk those TV contracts.

They called every single thing possible on us and nothing that wasn't brutally obvious on Denver tonight.

[Note30]

Can't we believe we blew most of our trade assets on this **** center. Clint Capela would have been better tonight. Isiah Hartenstein would have been better. Embarrassing.

Settle down. Its easy to be emotional in gut wrenching loss like this. But no need to go overboard. And forget the stellar season up to this point.


He had an awful game, but that was it is, a single game.

It just sucks watching Ant realizing if we don't win here we have no way to get him real help this off season. It's sad. He's the best thing to happen to this team since KG.

[Calinks]

We should consider trading Rudy way before KAT. He's a non factor.

KAT didn't play well cause he had to guard their best player all night. Rudy let Gordon score 30 pts. Who TF even is Aaron Gordon.

I agree but the return we can get from Rudy will probably be far away the one we can get from KAT. Both have been extremely disapointing so far.

Anger and bitterness.

I think KAT has been pretty good actually until the last two games and even last game he was one of the few bright spots on offense early. A problem we have is this team has never found a way to integrate KAT very effectively into the offense. He has been very efficient until the last two games with his scoring numbers and that was nice but we have yet to figure out all season how to get KAT to go off with this team configuration. We have also failed to figure out a good two man game between Towns and Edwards.

A big advantage Denver had tonight is they had plays and familiarity to get offense when they needed. Jokic and Murray two man game is elite, Boston has Tatum and Brown, even Dallas has Kyrie and Luka who still aren't totally simpatico but they can both get off in games.

We haven't figured out a way to effectively get Towns and Edwards feeding off of each other. I think that is the next major step for this team if they do keep the core together. We have to get Towns back to that 25PPG scorer if need be for certain games. Right now its just largely his iso offense here and there and some open looks but no flow or synergy as part of the larger offense.

[Note30]

It's an absolute damn shame we wasted a performance like that from Ant tonight, he was electric on both ends of the court and left everything on the court tonight.

None of his teammates picked him up.
Jaden and Mike were OK but not great.

NAW was brutally awful.
Kyle was -18 in 6 minutes and if that doesn't give the coaching staff a wake up call that a backup PG needs to be taking his minutes, even if that's J-Mac, I don't know what will.

But the real story of this series is that Jokic and Gordon are absolutely destroying Towns and Gobert.
26/38 from the field tonight.
Gobert is too light in the behind to guard Jokic straight up, he just walks him down into the paint and shoots a 5 footer over him.
Towns gives a little more resistance but gets absolutely lost on help defense.

And KAT was an absolute sh*tshow on offense, he lost us the game in the first half.
Rudy was also terrible with 5 turnovers to 5 FGA and 4 FT misses, but at least he was getting other players buckets by setting screens.

Aaron Gordon is the MVP of this series for them so far and is doing exactly what he is supposed to be doing, and if we keep treating him like he is Mark effing Madsen, we will continue to lose.
Denver smartly just keeps putting KAT and Rudy on skates out there and reading and then attacking their overplays.
The same damn thing we should be doing to Jokic who is not a guy who ever contests hard at the rim.

We're not playing much like a team that trusts their teammates to defend their matchup one on one right now, and it's turning into a lot of really really bad defense.

Naz is the only one who really gives Jokic any resistance at all.

That thumping we gave them in Denver woke them the Eff up, and if we can't beat them at home with a performance like this from Ant, I don't know that we can win another one.
Maybe if KAT misses the plane to Denver somehow.

And a serious EFF YOU to the league for giving us Tony Brothers and Scott Foster for our two games at home.
You want the fans to think somehow you're better than pro wrestling and you send in the two biggest clowns everyone and their mother knows you use to rig games to extend series and milk those TV contracts.

They called every single thing possible on us and nothing that wasn't brutally obvious on Denver tonight.

Couldn't have written it as well as you.

[Loaf_of_bread]

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Straight up depressing. How do you lose the 2 minutes 40 seconds he sat by 13? Wtf?

We have no backup playmaker. Nobody who can get buckets as a guard.

It's just Ant. Give me CJ McCollum, give me Austin Reaves, give me Andrew Nembhard, give me someone who can get a damn bucket and handle the ball.

We need what Andre Igoudala was for the warriors.

I thought NAW could be that guy and that's why I turned around during the first round but that's way too much pressure to put on a guy who was almost out of the league two seasons ago.

We needed a 3pt shooter at the deadline. Morris was a strange choice. This series is just getting started...

[younggunsmn]

I agree but the return we can get from Rudy will probably be far away the one we can get from KAT. Both have been extremely disapointing so far.

Anger and bitterness.

I think KAT has been pretty good actually until the last two games and even last game he was one of the few bright spots on offense early. A problem we have is this team has never found a way to integrate KAT very effectively into the offense. He has been very efficient until the last two games with his scoring numbers and that was nice but we have yet to figure out all season how to get KAT to go off with this team configuration. We have also failed to figure out a good two man game between Towns and Edwards.

A big advantage Denver had tonight is they had plays and familiarity to get offense when they needed. Jokic and Murray two man game is elite, Boston has Tatum and Brown, even Dallas has Kyrie and Luka who still aren't totally simpatico but they can both get off in games.

We haven't figured out a way to effectively get Towns and Edwards feeding off of each other. I think that is the next major step for this team if they do keep the core together. We have to get Towns back to that 25PPG scorer if need be for certain games. Right now its just largely his iso offense here and there and some open looks but no flow or synergy as part of the larger offense.

Brother, I hate to break it to you, but KAT and Ant have been together for 4 years now.
We all have been praying for that, It aint happening.

Even when KAT is making shots, he's doing dumb stuff like taking early shot clock 30 footers and falling to the floor on his drives.
No coach or system or teammate is going to make him any better after 9 seasons of the same schtick.
He's only a 25 PPG scorer on a bad team, sucking all the oxygen out of the offense and not helping his teammates.
He has a career assist/TO ratio of 3.2/2.7 and it's only gotten worse as the team has gotten better.
Ant has leveled up and KAT has most certainly not, and when the defenses get better and more intense, his game falls apart and he pulls the team down with him.

NAW was also disturbingly bad on offense tonight taking some iffy shots during times when Denver was on a run and missing them pretty badly.

If we lose this series after being up 2-0, this iteration of the team has peaked, even if we miraculously aren't forced to cut salary in the summer, because we won't be getting past Denver in either of the next 2 years either. barring some kind of injury to Jokic.

[Guidus88]

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Gobert was +9
Towns +3

The problem tonight was the bench that outside of Reid didn’t show…the sequence before half time was brutal

So weird that after 3 years we still struggle to find a solution to opponent PF… Brandon Clark and Aaron Gordon torched us…

At the start of series I would have been ok if some1 told me that we were 2-2 after 4 games. The problem is that now the inertia is on them and all have to show the Edward’s dog mentality to overcome nuggets shooting.

I’d be iper surprised if we win the series!

[TwolvesFanRome]

We threw a 2-0 win out the window. We probably also threw qualification out the window. I believe that the psychological and emotional part of the series tilts dramatically in Denver's favor now.

I can't believe we pass from that basketball to this...especially for our second unit.

Torched by Gordon, can't believe it.

[LondonWolf91]

Can't we believe we blew most of our trade assets on this **** center. Clint Capela would have been better tonight. Isiah Hartenstein would have been better. Embarrassing.

Settle down. Its easy to be emotional in gut wrenching loss like this. But no need to go overboard. And forget the stellar season up to this point.


He had an awful game, but that was it is, a single game.

2nd game in a row where he was awful

[Nick K]

Blazer fan chiming in again. Just remember, the Wolves are my playoff team this year before I say anything. Now that we got that out of the way.

I really think overall in the first two games of the series, the Wolves didn't have any pressure and expectations on them for stealing those two games in Denver. They did it and all of a sudden they're mega favorites to beat the Nuggets. This is where the inexperience comes in. The young OKC Thunder as the #1 seed in the West is dealing with that too.

Are you guys are real? Yes, you are despite the disappointment of the last two games. I still stand by that statement. This is a good learning experience no matter how this series turns out with Denver. Anthony Edwards is going be debated as the best player in the NBA very soon. He's only 22 and he's a winner.

The future is still bright in Minnesota despite the recent disappointment. Besides, you can't expect Aaron Gordon to continue to shoot 11-12 from the field, right?

What great pithy comments those are. It's down to a best of 3 series now. I like us next game.

[Shem]

Blazer fan chiming in again. Just remember, the Wolves are my playoff team this year before I say anything. Now that we got that out of the way.

I really think overall in the first two games of the series, the Wolves didn't have any pressure and expectations on them for stealing those two games in Denver. They did it and all of a sudden they're mega favorites to beat the Nuggets. This is where the inexperience comes in. The young OKC Thunder as the #1 seed in the West is dealing with that too.

Are you guys are real? Yes, you are despite the disappointment of the last two games. I still stand by that statement. This is a good learning experience no matter how this series turns out with Denver. Anthony Edwards is going be debated as the best player in the NBA very soon. He's only 22 and he's a winner.

The future is still bright in Minnesota despite the recent disappointment. Besides, you can't expect Aaron Gordon to continue to shoot 11-12 from the field, right?

What great pithy comments those are. It's down to a best of 3 series now. I like us next game.

Agreed. Pressure is on Denver now.

[Guidus88]

Blazer fan chiming in again. Just remember, the Wolves are my playoff team this year before I say anything. Now that we got that out of the way.

I really think overall in the first two games of the series, the Wolves didn't have any pressure and expectations on them for stealing those two games in Denver. They did it and all of a sudden they're mega favorites to beat the Nuggets. This is where the inexperience comes in. The young OKC Thunder as the #1 seed in the West is dealing with that too.

Are you guys are real? Yes, you are despite the disappointment of the last two games. I still stand by that statement. This is a good learning experience no matter how this series turns out with Denver. Anthony Edwards is going be debated as the best player in the NBA very soon. He's only 22 and he's a winner.

The future is still bright in Minnesota despite the recent disappointment. Besides, you can't expect Aaron Gordon to continue to shoot 11-12 from the field, right?

What great pithy comments those are. It's down to a best of 3 series now. I like us next game.

Agreed. Pressure is on Denver now.

pression is on us guys. Even if we win next one Denver already demonstrated that they are capable of winning a road game vs us or two in a row.

As i said before the inertia is on them and we have probably lost all the enthusiasm that we built in previous weeks. We need to regroup pretty quickly since next game is in two days.

In any case, however it goes, we have been robbed in game 3 since Murray should have been suspended. And this is something that needs to be highlighted.