Game Day: Knicks @ Timberwolves, 3/31/21
The Knicks hit the road to the Land of 10,000 Lakes to take on the Timberwolves, losers of six of their last eight. Can New York get back on track after a tough loss to Miami?
The Knicks are back on the road again after a disappointing foray back home against the Heat on Monday.
They’d better take advantage of this opportunity against a weak Timberwolves team, too, because they have a heck of a test at home against the Mavericks coming up on Friday.
But let’s not dwell on the past and future, let’s live in the present. The Timberwolves are not good. They weren’t good the last time the Knicks faces them, either, but that didn’t stop the Knicks from almost snatching a defeat from the jaws of victory after a big second-half comeback by the Wolves.
This time around, the Knicks need to make a statement and keep their foot on the gas the entire way. The Wolves haven’t proven that they can beat any team that’s halfway decent: of their 11 wins, only four have come against teams that figure to make the playoffs this year, and of those four wins, two came on same-team back-to-backs, which are always difficult to sweep even for the best teams.
The Wolves have lost 16 of their last 20, or if you want to narrow the focus a little, they’ve lost five of their last six. Their only win came against the Rockets, who very recently had lost 20 straight games. I must stress again, the Knicks need to wipe the floor with the Wolves. Minny is not good.
Stopping Karl-Anthony Towns is of course the big challenge here, but Anthony Edwards has been playing better of late as well. Over his last 15, Edwards is averaging 23.7 points, albeit on less than ideal efficiency. Still, it’d be a dangerous game for the Knicks to let Edwards go off, particularly if Malik Beasley decides to show up as well. Those three combined could score upwards of 80 points if they go off, and the Knicks sometimes struggle to score more than 90 as a team.
Putting RJ Barrett on Edwards is probably the move, as well as letting Randle man up with Towns while Nerlens Noel roams the paint. Asking Noel to box out Towns all night and compete with him physically would be a mistake.
Other than that, the Knicks need to just execute. And it might be helpful to get Immanuel Quickley back in with the starters and Alec Burks back with the bench. That would allow the Knicks to blitz the Wolves early with the IQ/RJ/Randle combo while letting Burks feast against the Minny bench. I’m not holding my breath, though — it seems like Thibs is content to just start flat every game with Elfrid Payton destroying any measure of spacing the Knicks have or could have.
The game is at 8 PM on MSG. Feel free to comment along here or join us on Twitter!
