Timberwolves Stock Up, Stock Down After Preseason Loss To Pistons

The Timberwolves showed off their new era in front of their hometown fans for the first time Wednesday night in a preseason matchup against the Pistons at Target Center.

With the regular-season opener one week away, the lower bowl was full Wednesday, and fans were loud. But their excitement was met with a 128-106 Wolves loss in a game that was overall uninspiring.

Who trended up against Detroit and who—or what—trended down?

Trending up: Jonathan Kuminga

Before Wednesday, Kuminga had yet to have the type of performance that made him look like the player the Wolves tried so hard to recruit this summer. He scored eight points in Minnesota’s preseason opener, shot 1 of 9 against Indiana, and did not play against Miami or New York.

But Kuminga was back in the lineup against Detroit, and he looked dynamic within Minnesota’s offense against a physical defense. Kuminga scored a preseason-high 16 points on 5 of 6 shooting and 2 of 3 from deep. He also grabbed four rebounds and dished out three assists.

It was encouraging to see Kuminga knock down two triples. He has never been a prolific three-point shooter in the NBA, but making enough catch-and-shoot threes to keep the defense honest is important. Inevitably, though, defenses will guard Kuminga differently because he is not an above-average shooting threat. They will sag off and attempt to load up in the paint. To combat that, Kuminga getting downhill quickly and making smart reads is important. We saw him do that against the Pistons.

Kuminga made two quality passes inside to Rudy Gobert. One was a dump-off and the other a lob. Kuminga has shown flashes of early chemistry with Minnesota’s big man. Players have historically needed time to get on the same page with Gobert, figuring out when and where he wants the ball passed to him. But Kuminga seems ahead of that curve. He is a sneakily good passer when attacking the rim. Kuminga showed that against the Pistons and must continue to do so into the regular season.

Trending down: Minnesota’s perimeter defense

This was just a bad game overall for Minnesota, especially on defense. Players seemed dejected. They were collectively a step behind Detroit’s offensive sets, especially on the perimeter, which absolutely cannot happen consistently this season as Minnesota ushers in its new era.

Detroit outscored the Wolves 64-30 in the paint. A good chunk of the Pistons' damage in close came at the rim. Jalen Duren scored a game-high 24 points, all of which came in the first half. He set brick-wall screens, and the Wolves did a horrible job fighting through them. Duren is one of the NBA’s strongest players. His screens are very effective. Still, Cade Cunningham or whoever was handling the ball for Detroit was able to attack off those screens with ease and create open looks. That happened with either Gobert or Joan Beringer manning center.

Aside from those two, the Wolves enter this season lacking rim-protecting size in their rotation. That is part of their new era. They want to be a faster-paced team that thrives on ball movement and a fun style of basketball. Being smaller and more athletic overall will help in that mission, but it will also hurt their rim defense and rebounding abilities.

The Wolves can—and must—make up for their lack of size as a team. Anthony Edwards, LaMelo Ball, Jaden McDaniels, Ayo Dosunmu, and Co. must stay engaged at the point of attack, applying the kind of pressure that makes it hard for the opponent to generate momentous rim attacks that test Gobert and Beringer. 

Last season, the Wolves had games where their perimeter pressure was lacking, as it was Wednesday at Target Center. Low energy levels appearing in a preseason game is whatever. These games don’t really matter. But the mid-January games? Those matter, even if they may feel less important than others. In that scenario, we saw Minnesota’s point-of-attack defense struggle last season. But in this new era, the Wolves must further reduce how often their defense has complete-game power outages. If they don’t, deflating games at Target Center will happen more than fans would like to see.

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