Spurs at Timberwolves Game Thread

Spurs at Wolves
7:00 pm CST
FS North

The Spurs are coming off a home win against the Phoenix Suns last night that pushed their record to 22-15 as the continue to draft along toward the bottom of the Western Conference playoff seedings. Of course, the Spurs are used to going through soft periods as they have perfected the art of peaking at the end of the year, and are committed to resting their players and doing everything they can to stay healthy.

They are also without Kawhi Leonard, who is out with a somewhat mysterious hand problem, and will likely be without Manu GInobili, who left last night's game with back spasms. Extremely unlikely that Pop doesn't give him at least tonight off with their next game being Tuesday in Washington.

This will be the third meeting between these squads, and in the first two, the Wolves weren't able to slow down the Spurs offense at all. The Spurs shot a ridiculous 56% from the field over those two games, and more or less used their passing talent to get anything they wanted. That hasn't been the story for most of the season, as the Spurs are sporting only a slightly above average offense so far; they are shooting it reasonably well, but committing too many turnovers and not getting to the line enough to be an elite offense.

They are a top 10 defensive squad, however, as they do a good job forcing tough shots and are one of the best defensive rebounding teams in the league.

The Wolves meanwhile...14 in a row. And last night was one of the uglier ones, as they were forced to go without a point guard the whole game. Mo Williams, who missed last night due to an ankle injury suffered in the loss to the Suns on Wednesday, is listed as doubtful for tonight and I really can't see him playing but it looks like he's going to give it ago as of this writing. Shabazz Muhammad is questionable with some kind of abdominal strain suffered last night, but my guess is he'll give it a go. is out for tonight's game.

I've harped on the point guard situation enough...wait, no I haven't. This is some really poor management in my view; I can't see how it helps anyone's development to play without a point guard, which they arguably have done since Rubio went down. Mo Williams is more of a combo guy and his flaws show when being asked to run a team for long stretches. LaVine isn't a point guard at all, and probably shouldn't be playing at this point in his career. I don't see how this is helping even him, as his struggles continue to mount and Flip runs him out there for 18 straight minutes then benches him for poor play, letting Robbie Hummel run the point last night in the fourth quarter.

As noted before, tanking is one thing, not having a point guard on the active roster for weeks at a time is another. I can't imagine this is good for anyone, except maybe for Flip's storehouse of excuses.

Expected lineups

Spurs

Tony Parker
Danny Green
Marco Belinelli
Tim Duncan
Tiago Splitter

Wolves

Zach LaVine
Andrew Wiggins
Chase Budinger
Thaddeus Young
Gorgui Dieng

Here's a link to our blogging buddies at Pounding The Rock. Be excellent.

No no and no.

Enjoy the game. Chat here. Go Wolves.