Archives For Nikola Pekovic

Spurs 116, Wolves 100: The long and weary road is long and weary

Zach Harper —  March 22, 2012 — 3 Comments

This one was not so fun.

Game six of the seven-game road trip looked like this team was just tired of being away from the Target Center. The energy was low, the effort was inadequate and the Wolves just seemed like they wanted out of there. I don’t really blame them. Not having Pekovic and Rubio has taken a toll on this team. The inside of the lane is a lot harder to patrol for the Wolves on both ends. The top of the defense is trying, but they’re just not the same without Rubio and his elastic wingspan deterring basic passes around the perimeter and into the post.

Gregg Popovich probably knew exactly how this game was going to go. Without Pekovic inside, he was going to make Love be a primary defender against the older but still effective Tim Duncan. If the Wolves fought back early, he’d probably unleash Manu and Parker drives all night. If not, he’d let Timmy break the will of Minnesota by showing them that even this old man could kick their butts on any given night. The Spurs had their perimeter attack waiting in the wings (no pun intended… okay, maybe it was a little intended) to unleash on a tired and road weary Wolves team. The Spurs are number one in the league in 3-point percentage and they’ll break your backs and runs with it.

In the end, the Wolves just were outmanned and out-energized for this game. One more Friday night in OKC before they get to come home and reacquaint themselves with home briefly. Grades after the jump. Continue Reading…

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Hornets 95, Wolves 89 – Not the time traveling you want to do

Zach Harper —  March 12, 2012 — 1 Comment

I kept waiting for Jonny Flynn to check in.

I’m not even trying to be a smartass here. That game felt a lot like last season and it was a malaise over the team that I just didn’t want any part of anymore. Maybe that’s why it’s taken a day for me to sit down and write this recap. If I don’t write it, if we don’t talk about it, if we pretend everything is just fine then maybe it will go back to how it used to be. But that’s not the reality. The reality is injuries happen and everybody has to deal with it.

To expect the Wolves to lose Ricky Rubio Friday night and then come into the next day’s game without a practice and without a shoot around and still come out with fire seems a little unfair. The Wolves had very little time to process the news as a team. There were certain members of the team that probably assumed the worst Friday night. There were guys that didn’t know the news until some time on Saturday. The “grieving process” was truncated much like this season.

Even still, the Wolves had a home game against the New Orleans Hornets on Saturday night and there was no reason to lose that game. We all had flashbacks to last season. Kevin Love put up insane numbers once again. His 31 points and 16 rebounds happened almost effortlessly. He tipped in missed shots. He faced up and made jumpers. He got to the free throw line and made nine of those 10 attempts. It was a pretty easy scoring night as he put guys like Lance Thomas and Gustavo Ayon in a hurt locker for much of the game.

Speaking of effortless, the Wolves’ defense seemed to be completely uninspired. They gave up 44 points in the paint to a Hornets team that employs Chris Kaman as the best scoring option. Only eight of his team-high 20 points came inside. The rest were on jumpers from all over the baseline. Marco Belinelli, Gustavo Ayon, and Lance Thomas helped score inside. The Wolves watched the ball move and then reacted. There was little anticipation. Positioning was off-kilter.

Everything was a fog of excrement.

Offensively, it was probably worse. The team turned the ball over 17 times and gave up 25 points off of those turnovers. In the previous 10 games with Ricky, they were averaging 13 turnovers per game and only 15 points off of them. Luke seemed tentative setting guys up early and it set the tone for how the rest of the game finished. Guys didn’t move the ball like they had been doing. Movement without the ball was minimal.

As Inspectah Deck once said, “Life without Ricky shouldn’t be so tough.”

I’m not so sure that the Wolves were running a lot of plays under Ricky. It was basically calling out a pick-and-roll half the time and seeing where his magic carpet ride of passing would take them. Saturday night, that carpet was stuck in neutral and incapable of going anywhere. Broken plays turned into facepalms. Executed sets became bailouts for a horrible Hornets team. The Wolves got out to a decent start offensively because Love and Pekovic were dominating the interior. Once the Hornets closed off offensive rebounding areas, the Wolves had no answer.

Malcolm Lee made his debut and he wasn’t terrible. His defense, especially the help defense, was vaguely energizing. He blocked a couple of shots, got a steal and sealed off driving lanes by Greivis Vasquez. Offensively, he looked like a deer in headlights trying to set the team up. He picked up his dribble early to move the ball to the next station. He had one nice drive to the basket that he ended up missing a layup to finish. Other than that, there wasn’t a lot of leadership with him on the floor.

Wayne Ellington had the cobwebs dusted off of him and he scored 12 points off the bench. He was one of the few guys that didn’t hesitate when he got the ball. He just caught it and fired, like you’d expect an NBA shooter to do. It made me think that the Wolves are going to need more of this and more of Beasley initiating offense off the bench if they want to survive the next 24 games.

The Wolves shot poorly (5/23 from 3-point range), only Luke moved the ball (mostly in the fourth), and you rarely saw this team get out in transition to get easy scoring chances.

Maybe this game was a wakeup call for Minnesota. Ricky is gone, this is the worst it can probably get, and the team needs to rally for the rest of the season. Or maybe this is the norm of what we’re going to see – a lot of flashbacks from last season in real time right now. Personally, I’d be shocked if Adelman let this team feel sorry for itself for very long. This isn’t Kurt Rambis sauntering through his workday. This is one of the better NBA coaches of the last 25 years figuring out adjustments for this team.

Here’s hoping we don’t look down the bench anymore out of habit and wonder when Jonny Flynn will get minutes.

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Timberwolves 95, Suns 104: We’re Still Here

Benjamin Polk —  March 2, 2012 — 6 Comments

Of course it is ridiculously unfair that the Timberwolves were playing their third game in three nights while the Suns had been reading romance novels and drinking margaritas by the pool (probably) for the past week.  But such is the absurdity of this lockout-contaminated NBA schedule. What you cannot control you must accept: good people get sick; the world rewards the ruthless and craven. Think about it like that and playing lots of basketball suddenly doesn’t seem so bad, does it?

Basketball playing humans have an extraordinary capacity to focus their mental energies and play through fatigue, and on this score the Wolves played pretty admirably. But all the grit and willpower in the world won’t make your jumper fall when your legs turn to jelly. The Wolves’ shooting is mercurial under the best of circumstances; on a night like tonight, it didn’t really seem like the ball had a prayer of going in the basket.

Continue Reading…

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Mid-season 3-on-3: the future is calling

Benjamin Polk —  February 28, 2012 — 15 Comments

In the future, the Wolves will make the playoffs and we will all live in places like this.

The regular season is just a tick over halfway done. Almost miraculously, your Timberwolves have won as many times in 33 games as they did all of last year. They have players that do incredible things, players that people enjoy watching. It seems possible that they may actually be competing for a playoff spot as the season winds down. The days of dreary, callow basketball, of loss after disheartening loss, seem to be over.

But the riddle is far from solved. The Wolves remain incomplete, full of gaps and shortcomings. And they face a punishing schedule, sure to deplete whatever reserves of energy they may have stowed away during their long weekend. So Zach, Myles and I will here attempt to tackle some of the big questions facing the Wolves as the season’s second half gets underway.

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Michael Beasley shows out

Zach Harper —  February 23, 2012 — 6 Comments

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KYDzvmoGIcE

The Wolves debuted this video the other night at the Target Center during the game against Philadelphia. It was during a timeout when this hit the jumbotron.

Everybody seemed to be enjoying the singing of the various Wolves players, ironically or not. Then it got to Beas’ part and it was the  awkward extended stay on him trying to figure out the lyrics that lured everybody’s attention to a heightened state. As he started to get into the flow of the song, I looked down at the players coming out of the huddle, some discussing strategy and some looking up at the scoreboard in awe of what Beasley was doing.

I panned my vision over to Beasley, who was busy trying to get assistant coach Jack Sikma to look up at the board to witness the show that was about to explode when Beas remembered the lyrics. Beasley was into it and the rest of the team was too. It was something that could have completely removed focus from Mike and what he needed to do coming out of the timeout. But instead, he seemed to have a little more pep in his step.

I was so enthralled with Beasley’s reaction to himself that I never saw the Pekovic part or knew it happened. That was a pleasant surprise.

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Wolves 100, Jazz 98: Finding your role within chaos

Zach Harper —  February 23, 2012 — 11 Comments

That was the weirdest and most fun comeback I’ve experienced in a long time.

There was no reason for the Wolves to win that game last night and maybe that’s why the comeback was so fun. Everything was working against Minnesota for so long in that game, that the comeback never really seemed real to me until the final minute of the game. The Wolves were essentially without three of their starters for most of this contest, even though they logged a combined 99 minutes in the game.

Kevin Love, Ricky Rubio and Nikola Pekovic were not good last night. Rubio looked slow and incapable of running the offense. He made a couple of 3-pointers, but he seemed more intent on earning foul calls than getting quality shots in the second half. Nikola Pekovic was playing on a bum ankle, but didn’t seem to be really affected by it. He just couldn’t make shots inside, no matter how many times he grabbed the rebound. And then there was Kevin Love.

Before the game, Love talked about how he’s wiped out physically. During the first few minutes of the game, it looked like something was seriously wrong with him. When Utah jumped out to an early lead, Adelman called a timeout to quell the storm. As Love came to the bench, he was completely red and sucking in as much oxygen as he could possibly manage. He had his head in a towel with Michael Beasley trying to offer words of encouragement. It looked as though he had an illness, and maybe he did if you consider pure exhaustion to be an ailment.

So there the Wolves were; getting their teeth kicked in by an impressive frontcourt. First 20 points of the game for Utah were scored in the paint. They were bullying Kevin Love and Nikola Pekovic like it was two Darkos. Passes were being picked off, dribbles were being lost and the easiest of interior shots were complicated endeavors.  Continue Reading…

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Wolves in Motion: Getting Kevin Love easy buckets against the Rockets

Zach Harper —  February 22, 2012 — 7 Comments

The Wolves got Kevin Love a couple of easy baskets against the Houston Rockets during their fourth and final meeting of the season by finding ways to get him moving across the lane and into the strong side of the floor. I thought I’d examine a couple of plays by breaking down how they developed and the options it leaves Minnesota on the floor. I figured I’d get my Sebastian Pruiti on for a little bit.  Continue Reading…

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Timberwolves 111, Rockets 98: The bear speaks

Benjamin Polk —  February 18, 2012 — 10 Comments

 

Woodville Caton

I do not understand the sentence “Nikola Pekovic scored 30 points in one game.” The Scientologists would probably urge me to exhaustively research the etymologies of each individual word, but that probably wouldn’t help much (although you never know–there are so many levels of consciousness I’ve yet to attain…). I mean, I just watched the actual game in question with my own eyes and it’s still beyond me. Part of the mystification centers on the sight of Pekovic casually dropping in gentle layup upon uncontested dunk upon easy bankshot. Professional basketball is complicated. Dribbling or shooting a basketball while some of the tallest, quickest men on the planet attempt to prevent you from doing same? Really hard to do. This is a player who struggled last season to wrest floor time away from Darko Milicic, who induced widespread stink-faces whenever he began to dribble the basketball, who just could not stop fouling. It is not supposed to look as simple and easy as Pek made it look on Friday.

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Wolves 102, Bobcats 90: K.I.S.S.

Zach Harper —  February 16, 2012 — 19 Comments

Keep it simple, stupid.

It’s funny how basic professional basketball can be sometimes. You’re bigger and stronger than the opponent so you pound it inside and get easy points. You have a problem with turnovers so you just stay more patient and stop giving the ball to the other team. You’re facing the worst team in the league, start off slowly and just wait for them to regress to the mean.

This was the night against the Charlotte Bobcats. The Wolves look disinterested early on, giving up EASY baskets to Corey Maggette, Reggie Williams, and everybody else in the Charlotte unis. It was like the Wolves weren’t taking this game seriously at all. And maybe they weren’t. That’s what happens when you’re facing a team on a 15-game losing streak that happens to have a scoring margin of around -15 this season.

Minnesota gave up 30 points in the first quarter to a team that hadn’t reached 90 points in seven straight games. Not to take anything away from the Bobcats but I’m totally going to take everything away from the Bobcats here. They’re a horrible team that can’t score and the only way they have a 30-point first quarter is if you don’t take them seriously.

By the time the Wolves got around to caring, they were able to slow the momentum and scoring attack of the Bobcats while getting their own game on track. JJ Barea had his best game as a T’Pup so far with 12 points (4/9 shooting) and eight assists with zero turnovers. He controlled the pace of the game for the Wolves when he was on the floor without Ricky, which is something he hadn’t been able to show much at all this season.

Outside of the mean slapping Charlotte in the face, this game was won with the play of Kevin Love and Nikola Pekovic.

After the game, Love was talking about how much the presence of Nikola Pekovic opens up Kevin’s game for him. And I’d imagine the same could be said the other way around. You’re not moving Pek when he’s getting position inside. I’ve been up close for almost every home game this season and I’ve watched player after player try to move him out of the spot he wants on the floor. It just doesn’t happen. Once he plants himself in the lane, you need a bulldozer to even think about displacing him.

The way to counteract that is to be in his way. Again, it sounds simple but if you’re already in the spot the post player wants then he has to wedge you out of there. If he tries to move you from the spot with his upper body, you’re going to see a lot of offensive fouls called (Dwight Howard does this a lot). The problem is if you’re in help defense because Kevin Love is on the floor, it’s really hard to beat Pek to sitting down in the key where you have no chance of stopping him from making his post move.

Love spreads the floor for Pek and in turn, Pek opens up the floor for Love. As a help defender, you know you have to keep a body on Pek so he can’t set up camp right in front of the basket for an easy hoop. This leaves Kevin with one-on-one coverage for much of the area between his man and the basket. Love mentioned that in situations like this he knows he has a great chance of getting off a good shot or getting to the free throw line. He credited a lot of that to the presence Pekovic has given the Wolves down low.

The symbiotic relationship the two big men seem to have on the court is developing into a deadly combination. Yes, they went against the Bobcats Wednesday night and you should be able to do whatever you want against the second worst defense in the NBA. They combined for 51 points and 29 rebounds against Charlotte’s frontcourt. The Wolves got 34 attempts at the rim (14 attempts by Pekovic) and shot 50.6% from the field for the entire game.

The Wolves didn’t have to do too much against a horrendous Bobcats team. They survived Kemba Walker’s streaky shooting, Boris Diaw’s versatility on offense, and whatever terrible shots Corey Maggette decided to put up throughout the game. Wes Johnson did a great job of forcing Maggette into bad and contested attempts after a good first quarter (4/8 in the first, 2/9 the rest of the game).

Wednesday night, the Wolves kept the gameplan and execution simple, and they let the talent on the floor naturally take over the game to win out.

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Wolves 86, Kings 84: Absence makes the heart grow… well that wasn’t so bad

Zach Harper —  February 8, 2012 — 8 Comments

While some might complain about Kevin Love’s suspension being unjust, I’m trying to look at it as a positive thing.

I’ve grown tired of Kevin Love’s complaining to officials this season. I’m fine if he wants to belabor a point or fight for his team verbally during stoppages in play, but when he’s taking an extra second or two to turnaround and complain to a referee that is booking it up the floor to keep up with the action (hint, hint: Kevin you should too), I find it disheartening to see a brief 4-on-5 defensive effort.

It’s not something that happens all the time. It happens maybe two or three times per game at most. It’s not costing the Wolves games either. It’s just a poor decision he makes that puts his team at risk of giving up scores and at a certain point, enough is enough.

The good thing about this suspension is it gives a real test to Nikola Pekovic, Michael Beasley and Derrick Williams to step up and prove their production without the attention defenses pay to Kevin Love. Anybody could argue that everybody on the Wolves benefits from Love’s presence out there and they certainly do to some extent. But that isn’t the reason someone like Ricky Rubio gets a lot of assists or Nikola Pekovic is able to have a presence inside.

With Love out last night, the entire team had a chance to prove themselves and they did a pretty good job. There were times when his absence was felt. The Wolves got sloppy with the ball, forced shots they normally wouldn’t have to take and had to deal with DeMarcus Cousins dominating the boards in the third quarter. However, players stepped up when they needed to and the Wolves dodged a bullet at the end to secure the win. Continue Reading…

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