The youth prevails.
Thanks to 72 combined points from Zach LaVine, Karl-Anthony Towns and Andrew Wiggins, the Minnesota Timberwolves took down the Sacramento Kings 113-104 on Wednesday night at the Target Center.
The Kings were without All-Star center DeMarcus Cousins, but Sacramento put up a solid fight throughout the entire game. Despite being down by as much as 14 in the third quarter, the Kings rallied back to make things interesting in the fourth.
But unfortunately for the Kings, LaVine had an absolutely ridiculous second half, finishing with all of his 23 points in the final 24 minutes.
“Zach just seemed like he was a little bit dragged (early),” Timberwolves interim head coach Sam Mitchell said. “Zach has been playing a lot of minutes lately. We talked to him at halftime and, you’ve got to pick it up… Little did I know, you’re thinking ‘pick it up,’ but not 23 [points] in the second half. Zach just has that talent, he’s explosive and we need it.”
It was a “winnable” game for the Wolves, especially without Cousins, but it was a big win for a team to win against a struggling team like Sacramento even if the Wolves did play to the Kings’ level for a chunk of the game.
“They’re like two different teams (without Cousins). He’s such a big presence on their team that you know the whole offense probably doesn’t go through him a lot of the time,” LaVine said. ” [Rajon] Rondo and him have the ball a majority of the time, so as a group they move the ball a lot more, they get up a lot more shots.”
Towns led all scorers with 26 points to go with 11 rebounds. Wiggins finished with 23 points while shooting 10-for-15 from the field. Gorgui Dieng had another double-double, finishing with 16 points and 12 rebounds while shooting 7-for-10 from the field.
Rondo picked up the slack in pretty much every category for Sacramento, finishing with 25 points, 12 assists, eight rebounds and three steals. Kosta Koufos added 15 points and 15 boards. Marco Belinelli led the second unit with 14 points, while Omri Casspi and Darren Collison finished with 12 each.
The Wolves move to 23-48 overall, sitting in 13th place in the West.
The Kings fall to 27-44, 11th in the West.
Numbers Game:
Leader of the Pack: Karl-Anthony Towns
Towns took advantage of the lack of Cousins on Wednesday night, finishing with 26 points, 11 rebounds, four blocks and two assists. Towns shot an efficient 11-for-17 from the field and 4-for-5 from the free-throw line.
He now has 42 double-doubles and has scored 20 or more points in 26 games.
Rookie of the Year, anyone?
“Karl has taken a beating. To his credit, he never complains, he just keeps picking himself up and keeps playing,” Mitchell said. “He’s given up size in the stretch. We’ve talked about since the very first day of training camp, about him being a high post center, playing at high post and being able to take the bigger guys away from the basket and the smaller guys off the post.”
Highlight of the Night:
We apologize in advance for reminding rookie Willie Cauley-Stein about this. We would want to forget ASAP, too. With 1:51 left in the first quarter, Wiggins pump faked from the corner and drove to the bucket. After that, well, here’s the video.
It gave the Wolves a 28-27 lead.
Up Next:
The Wolves will hit the road to face off against John Wall and the Wizards in Washington. Tip is set for 6 p.m. on Fox Sports North and WCCO 830-AM.
