NBA News NBA News, Match Reports and Updates 
The vibes are pretty, pretty good in Minnesota right now.
The Minnesota Timberwolves just finished yet another fairly complete victory to begin the season 3-0, with the Kawhi Leonard-less Toronto Raptors serving as the team’s latest victim.
Advertisement
Unlike the previous win over the Orlando Magic, the Wolves did not endure poor shooting nights from Anthony Edwards and LaMelo Ball en route to a 23-point victory. Things are starting to click, and this team has a ton of potential.
In the past, Timberwolves fans could consider games like this a trap game. The team has had a propensity to play down to lesser opponents and keep them in the game, especially if said opponents are missing one of their star players. Minnesota now has a good start to rewriting that narrative with this thorough dismantling of a weakened Eastern Conference team at the Target Center home opener.
Regardless of the evening’s narrative regarding Toronto missing Leonard, the Raptors are still widely considered to be one of the better teams in the now-loaded East. We’ll see how different things look later in the season when the Wolves play the Raptors in Toronto (and presumably with Leonard in the starting lineup), though this performance is exactly what should be expected of a Minnesota team with increasingly legitimate championship aspirations.
Jim Petersen said it himself. This all feels sustainable for the Timberwolves.
Advertisement
LaMelo Ball Impacts Winning
LaMelo Ball is good, dude. No, seriously.
Ball played a modest 17 minutes and finished the game at +33. This is, to put it mildly, a wildly inconsistent statistic, but it was felt today. His 15 points (on 5—for-8 shooting, 4—for-5 from three-point range) and eight assists tell the tale of how impactful his usage was in those minutes.
It was an opinion that was seemingly in the minority among NBA fans not located in Minnesota or Charlotte, though it is increasingly clear that LaMelo Ball has what it takes to be a winning player. Theatrics and demeanor aside, the guy makes smart plays and brings the best out of his teammates. There’s not much more you can ask from your starting point…
Source link : https://sports.yahoo.com/articles/timberwolves-117-raptors-94-sky-034041486.html
Author :
Publish date : 2026-10-26 03:40:00
Copyright for syndicated content belongs to the linked Source.
