Grades: San Antonio Spurs at Minnesota Timberwolves – Game #20
Keldon Johnson couldn’t stop San Antonio’s losing streak (Photo via Twitter)
Stop me if you’ve read this before but the San Antonio Spurs played well for long stretches of their game on Wednesday night … only to end up losing to the Minnesota Timberwolves by a final count of 102-94. It was San Antonio’s 15th straight loss. With the win, the Timberwolves improved to 16-4, which is the best record in the NBA.
Even though the Spurs were struggling to shoot the ball, they were able to control much of the first half thanks to their defense. At intermission, the good guys were up seven points, 53-46. Unfortunately, Minnesota started the second half with a 9-0 run to erase San Antonio’s advantage. To their credit, the Spurs were able to regain their footing enough to make it 71-71 heading into the final stanza.
Following a pair of Doug McDermott free throws, the Spurs were up by two points with 9:16 remaining. Sadly, that’s when the offensive attack went flat. In the next five minutes, the Timberwolves went on a 16-2 run to send the Spurs to their familiar spot in the loss column.
Yes, it was another good job, good effort performance. The Timberwolves are really good so asking for a road win would have been asking a lot. The Spurs also played some of their best defense of the season. San Antonio shooting 8-for-36 from three-point land was basically the beginning and the end of this story. Chalk it up as a moral victory of sorts — but a victory victory would be preferred right about now, to be honest.
Stats: Spurs at Timberwolves
Spurs at Timberwolves – Final Grades
Victor Wembanyama
The good: The coaching staff reportedly told Wembanyama to concentrate on his defensive matchup against Karl-Anthony Towns. On that front, San Antonio’s rookie did really well, as Towns only had six shot attempts to go along with six turnovers in 32 minutes. Wembanyama was good on the boards and kept his mistakes to a minimum (two turnovers and one foul in 32 minutes). The bad: The 19-year-old never found a rhythm on offense. It was like offense was an afterthought. His shot-selection wasn’t horrible but he could have gone up stronger or he could have made quicker passes. The net-net: This was clearly Wembanyama’s best game of individual defense. That said, it’s difficult to grade that against what was otherwise a ho-hum outing.
Grade: C+
Devin Vassell
Vassell was back in the starting lineup and his difficult shot-making prevented the Spurs from really melting down on the offensive end. He took a lot of hard shots and made a lot of hard shots. Vassell also authored some strong drives to the rim and that diversity helped his overall impact. Playmaking-wise, he wasn’t doing much — but, then again, the Spurs really needed him to put points on the scoreboard. Defensively, he had a handful of commendable hustle plays.
Grade: A-
Keldon Johnson
I liked Johnson’s all-around energy level. His play wasn’t always pretty on offense but his heart was usually in the right place. He attacked the rim with vigor and made a handful of smart passes. Defensively, while his rebounding was good, he still had too many lapses. Johnson has to stay completely focused to not be a defensive liability. All in all, he did a lot of good but could have been quite a bit better if Johnson played a cleaner brand of basketball.
Grade: B+
Zach Collins
Yikes, bro, settle down. Collins launched a missile whenever he had an inch of daylight. I’m an advocate for him shooting threes but he needs to actually be open. Rushed perimeter jumpers shouldn’t enter his equation. Collins really shouldn’t be having games where he’s 6-for-20 from the field in 30 minutes. Passing-wise, he was pretty good — he just needed to do more of it. Defensively, Collins wasn’t sturdy enough in the paint and didn’t grab enough contested boards.
Grade: D-
Cedi Osman
If we had to label someone as the starting point guard tonight, it’d probably be Osman. He handled a lot of playmaking duties — and looked okay-ish at times. He’s not a natural lead playmaker but he plays the angles well and has better than advertised court vision. It’ll be interesting to see how he grows into the role if San Antonio keeps this starting five for a while. Defensively, Osman was decent. His positioning could have been better but he hustled and rebounded well.
Grade: B
Tre Jones
Jones’ inability to shoot really stuck out like a sore thumb tonight. The Timberwolves weren’t respecting his three-point shooting so there were multiple occurrences of San Antonio’s better shooters getting hurried by the defender who was supposed to be guarding Jones. The backup point guard made some good passes, played hard on defense and took care of the basketball — but his outing tonight will mostly be remembered for his shooting woes.
Grade: C
Jeremy Sochan
Moved to the bench, Sochan played 22 minutes against the Timberwolves. It was an uneven performance for the second year player. On offense, sometimes he passed up open shots and sometimes he shot when he should have passed the ball. He was in a scoring mode instead of a passing mode but it didn’t really work out for him. Defensively, he was better than he was on offense but his defensive decision-making wasn’t crisp either.
Grade: D+
Doug McDermott
With the Spurs desperate for a player who could hit the broad side of the SBC Center with a musket, McDermott played the most minutes he’s played in more than a month. I thought he did well. He didn’t hesitate to shoot anything resembling an open shot. He also completed a couple of quick-twitch passes. Defensively, he was much more alive than usual. He had a couple hiccups on that end but he remained active.
Grade: A-
Malaki Branham
Branham failed to make much of an impact in his ten minutes. He wasn’t notably terrible but he also didn’t do much good of note.
Grade: C
Julian Champagnie
Champagnie only played four minutes. That was long enough for him to hoist a three-pointer.
Grade: Inc.
Pop
I mean, given the losing streak, I can understand going away from the Jeremy Sochan Point Guard Experiment. But for Osman? That sounds like a neutral move at best. Consider me not a fan of that decision. And after playing so well against the Pelicans and with Collins playing bad, how does Bassey not get any minutes? Shuffling Branham and Champagnie to the fringes of the rotation also doesn’t sound like the greatest long-term move. That said, I like that Vassell was back in the starting lineup. And the Spurs were actually playing defense tonight, which I guess Pop deserves a kudo or two for.
Grade: D