Timberwolves pick up the pace, resuming role as an NBA offensive juggernaut 

Set the clock and watch the feet If you want to know why the Minnesota Timberwolves are abruptly an offensive juggernaut check out Bojangles Astaire aka Anthony Edwards as he do-si-dos his defensive dance partners into a menagerie of jilted embarrassments Peep the flutter-back fox trot where Ant appears to engage his man even as a fellow suitor slides in for a double-team only to tilt away from the feint in the backwards opposite direction aided by the momentum of a harsh crossover dribble setting the second foot for fadeaway liftoff It s a rapid-fire kiss-off requiring the core strength of a squirrel especially from the three-point hinterlands although Ant has minted an assortment of midranges into the flutter-back mix That sets up the polka for suckas retracing the same dance sequence except the flutter-back finale is a fake The dance partner smitten by the hard-to-get challenge posed by the step-back cants his body forward with a vigor as vulnerable as a swoon That s when Ant waltzes into a polka with a wide sidestep and a forward burst dribbling the ball like a yo-yo swaying through traffic with the improbable aplomb of a stunt man in an action movie until the plot thickens with a summit at the rim banker floater slam-dunk dish or maybe hard contact and a holler for the foul Related Timberwolves embarrassing regular season start scrambles expectations The clock is nearly as crucial as the footwork Ant hasn t totally broken his career-long habits of bringing the ball up the court in a walk or slow-trot surveying the scenery long enough for the defensive coverages to array bunch and synchronize according to the prevailing scheme and trying to force his way through thickets that ensnare but he has significantly reduced them And all of that saved time and more-rapid movement simplifies and improves the decision-making of Ant and his teammates by simultaneously creating more clear-cut options via cohesive rhythm and awareness Measuring pace in the NBA is a tricky endeavor The benchmark is the number of possessions per tournament but different contingencies are made for fouls and the free throws they generate turnovers and offensive rebounds that all have an impact on the number and length of possessions that are at odds with the overall speed of the event Even so it is apparent that accelerated decision-making has enhanced the efficiency of the Wolves offense Before the All-Star break of the - season last year Minnesota was th in pace and th in offensive rating points scored per possession with a record of - After the break they were st in pace and third in offensive rating propelling them to a record of - Thus far this season they are th in pace and fourth in offensive rating with a - record despite having the th rated defense points allowed per possession in the NBA The other dominant playmaker on the roster Julius Randle has often stated that an injury that cost him the entire month of February last season sixth before the All Star break and four after it enabled him to see how best to tailor his talents to boost the crew Petitioned for specifics after a home competition last month he replied Just needed to be more decisive Next-action basketball Understanding my sweet spot my teammates are doing a great job when I get double-teamed in the post drawing space But biggest thing is being quick and decisive and not holding the ball as much The end was a higher true shooting percentage which gives -pointers -pointers and free throws their proper weight per attempt and a better assist-to-turnover after the All Star break last season But an even-larger leap has been taken thus far this season From pre-break to post-break last season on to the first games thus far in the - campaign Randle s true shooting percentage has hopped from to and up to this season And his assist-to-turnover ratio has also climbed from before last year s All Star break to after the break and now to for the current season Obviously turnovers hurt efficiency Head coach Chris Finch likes to remind everybody that they happen majority of often in a crowd meaning when the ball movement isn t ahead of the traps and double teams deployed by the defense or when players are dribbling into coverage rather than getting off the ball Quick decisions and deft footwork are handy tools for avoiding crowds Because both Ant and Randle are efficient scorers on isolation plays and Finch and the Wolves have chosen to rely on that skill more than leaning into a classic point guard for playmaking the Wolves are never going to be a low-turnover crew But they are inexorably getting closer to the sweet spot cited by Randle where the dimes and buckets rise a little more steadily than the miscues In the five seasons where Finch has coached the unit since training camp the Wolves have finished st th nd th in turnovers per encounter and as of now rank th in the - season Better footwork quicker decision-making and thus enhanced execution by the two players who lead the Wolves in usage defined as direct engagement in the outcome of a possession have ratified last year s gains in offensive efficiency But the cherry on top of the Wolves attack thus far this season is breakout performance by erstwhile defensive specialist Jaden McDaniels as a two-way force to be reckoned with around the NBA While the NBA s Summer League was taking place in August of Finch sat in the luxurious aerie of his suite at the Wynn Hotel in Las Vegas and made an audacious analogy on the brink of his first full season as coach of the association At the time McDaniels had just concluded his rookie season and was more than a month away from his st birthday Nevertheless Finch laid down a heavy marker on the future prospects of his young forward I think and this is obviously a stretch goal for anybody but he can be Scottie Pippen-esque Finch commented comparing McDaniels to arguably the greatest second banana in NBA history We talked about competing every time down well he s guarding Luka Doncic and guarding James Harden Finch continued These guys are phenomenal players and if they beat him one time he is right back guarding them the next I love the kid He to me has such a great foundation I think his ceiling is high Very high This season the Pippen comp is still a pretty outlandish stretch but no longer ridiculous McDaniels has never had the opportunities to flex the way Pippen did on offense as the second option behind Michael Jordan and lead playmaker when MJ was off the court In my annual preseason interviews with Finch it has become somewhat of a running joke how a great number of years he has invoked getting Jaden more involved in the offense Through it all McDaniels has remained victim pouncing on expanding his profile when injuries create a need for an underrated element in his skill set When both Rudy Gobert and Randle went down last February he became a frontcourt stalwart switching off the center and power forward position with Naz Reid in a manner that showcased his rebounding and rim protection And when Ant tweaked his hamstring during the third challenge of the season McDaniels bore a chunk of the available offensive load that was tumbling down due to the superstar s absence In the four full games that Ant was sidelined McDaniels led the Wolves in minutes played and slid in beside Randle to sustain the double-dominant scorer approach Minnesota had informally adopted He averaged points per event on shooting from the field -for- from -point range -for- and from the foul line -for- Compelled to guard the opponent s top perimeter scorer in the absence of Ant and for two games Jaylen Clark McDaniels still grabbed rebounds and handed out assists per encounter In the four games since Ant s return McDaniels has forced Finch and the Wolves to literally create more space for him in the context of the offense than existed before the injury He s averaged points on shooting splits of from the field on a higher volume of three-pointers and from the foul line Yes it has only been games and the Wolves have had a very soft schedule seven of those games have been played against defenses that rank in the bottom eight of the NBA in terms of points allowed per possession And the point guard by committee situation still makes the company vulnerable to pressure defenses that pick up the ball-handler all -feet of the court McDaniels demands teammates to shoulder the ball-security duties and will be diminished as much as anybody if they can t Is McDaniels enjoying an extended boomlet of accuracy or is this a phenomenal step forward in his productivity He certainly isn t going to continue shooting from -point range Over his five previous full seasons his career-best was in - But to the extent the Wolves continue to generate good spacing and efficiency McDaniels will increasingly find his name near the top of the scouting document for opposing defenses The comparison to Pippen remains overblown but Finch was right about the breadth and caliber of McDaniels role in winning basketball games I once described his versatility as akin to a blank tile in a Scrabble encounter and stand by it The presence of Gobert on the roster coupled with the suffocating crew defense the Wolves were able to muster during their first of two trips to the Western Conference Finals has planted the idea that defensive excellence is the ongoing identity of this roster and by extension this franchise But after the All Star break a year ago the Wolves averaged points per possessions Thus far this season they are averaging points per possessions That s a combined games of top offensive efficiency As of Wednesday morning the Wolves true shooting percentage of led the NBA and that s with Ant missing four entire games playing only minutes in another and being incredibly rusty in his first competition back from injury The average accuracy on NBA three-pointers thus far this season is The Wolves have three players in the nine-man regular rotation shooting or better McDaniels Ant and Mike Conley Two others are shooting Randle and Jaylen Clark Two others are above average Donte DiVincenzo and Terrence Shannon Jr at apiece Will there be regression Sure from specific folks with Randle and McDaniels the primary candidates based on past career performance But Conley and DDV have been both more accurate on average over the past five years than their current numbers Ant led the NBA in three-point makes volume shooting at a rate last season and Naz Reid is shooting a career-worst this season after exceeding or flirting with accuracy from deep on high volume over the past two seasons Let s wrap this up with the Wolves the greater part newest performance in Utah Monday night against the pathetic Jazz Just hours earlier Minnesota led the same hapless opponent by after one quarter and by at the end of a thorough thrashing In that interim Utah had licked its wounds without a chance to get back on the court while the Wolves were playing a back-to-back on the road It is the type of letdown trap competition that has ambushed this Wolves franchise for a great number of years with precious inadequate exceptions And after the first minutes of action it was happening again as Utah was up by nine to The offense was stalled Gobert had converted six of his seven shots The rest of the club was -for- from -point range and -for- overall with just three trips to the free throw line Furthermore the effort was lacking The Jazz outrebounded the Wolves - in that span with six different Utah players grabbing at least one offensive board Related Wolves Coach Chris Finch on organization s young depth know your role keep it simple But in the final minutes of the battle the Wolves scored points Ant had points three rebounds and five assists Randle had too along with eight rebounds and four assists All in just one half plus four minutes of action Ant went dancing Randle discovered his sweet spots and through the first eight and a half minutes of the third quarter the Wolves outscored the Jazz - They finished with points in the third the fourth time in four games they had scored that countless With Ant and Randle both resting Utah steadily cut a -point third quarter deficit down to seven - with left to play That s when McDaniels went to work He took a dribble-handoff from Naz moving left toward the middle of the court along the arc before suddenly veering right up the gut of the paint between two defenders while a third seven-footer Yusuf Nurkic awaited Rather than finish the drive McDaniels pulled up for one of his patented rocking chair fadeaway floaters After a Utah miss McDaniels came right down and challenged the defense again driving left from the top of the arc drawing a foul on rookie Ace Bailey He sank both free throws Between those free-throw makes Ant entered the competition and seconds of playing time late hit McDaniels in transition speeding down the left side with Kyle Filipowski an inch less than seven feet in position to defend But Jaden exclusively didn t stop and used his body to shield his shooting hand while banking in the layup Just like that the lead was back up to courtesy of McDaniels personal six-point run He finished his scoring for the night with an emphatic slam dunk over the fouling Filipowski a -point play set up by another Ant feed this one to the weakside corner that enabled McDaniels wide access to the baseline drive The cool decision and aggressive flourish on the flush felt very Pippen-esque The post Timberwolves pick up the pace resuming role as an NBA offensive juggernaut appeared first on MinnPost