POSTGAME NOTES
ORLANDO MAGIC 97, MINNESOTA TIMBERWOLVES 96
January 20, 2021
TIMBERWOLVES NOTES
Player Notes
• D’Angelo Russell led the Timberwolves in scoring with 19 points and six assists. He connected on four shots from deep, marking his seventh game this season with 4+ threes.
• Malik Beasley tallied 13 points along with a season-high-tying seven rebounds and five assists accounting for his fifth career 10+ points/5+ rebounds/5+ assists game.
• In 26:06 of action off the bench, Jaden McDaniels finished with career-highs in scoring (12), rebounding (8) and a team-high-tying three blocks. He secured his first double-digit effort of the season and became the fourth Timberwolves rookie to record a stat line of 10+ points/8+ rebounds/3+ blocks off the bench joining Kevin Love, Felton Spencer and Sam Mitchell.
• In 29:11 minutes of play, Naz Reid scored 14 points, grabbed three rebounds and had a team-high-tying three blocks. This marks his third game of the season with three blocks.
• Josh Okogie registered his second double-figure game of the season with 11 points, six rebounds, one steal and one block.
• Jordan McLaughlin dished out a team-high seven assists off the bench along with his six points. He has now registered seven assists off the bench on five occasions and becomes the 14th Timberwolves players to have five or more games off the bench with at least seven assists.
Team Notes
• Minnesota outscored Orlando 30-10 in the second quarter to take a 51-35 at halftime, marking the 11th time in Timberwolves history the team has held an opponent to 10 points or below in the second quarter.
• Led by McDaniels and Reid’s three blocks each, The Timberwolves swatted a total of 12 blocks tonight. This marks the first time they have registered 12+ blocks since doing so on Oct. 29, 2018 vs. Los Angeles Lakers. In the second quarter, Minnesota tallied six blocks, accounting for the 14th time in franchise history they have registered at least six blocks in a quarter.
• The Timberwolves held Orlando to 27.5% in the first half, including 13% from the field in the second quarter. The last time a team shot under 28% from the floor in a half against the Timberwolves was Dec. 30, 2015 vs Utah (1st half, 11-of-41, 26.8%). Additionally, the last time a team shot 13% or lower in a quarter against the Timberwolves was Nov. 25, 2016 vs. Phoenix (4th quarter, 2-of-16,12.5%).
• Minnesota’s reserves outscored Orlando’s reserves 35-14. Marking the second straight game that the Minnesota bench has scored 30+ points (12th time this season).
Magic Notes
• Nikola Vučević led the way in scoring for Orlando with 28 points, eight rebounds and four assists.
• Aaron Gordon tallied 13 points, nine rebounds, seven assists and four blocks in 35:37 minutes of play.
TIMBERWOLVES HEAD COACH RYAN SAUNDERS
On the last stretch of tonight’s game…
“We didn’t do some things that got us to that point. Both offensively and defensively, we started making things up defensively in terms of let’s switch this instead of sticking to our solid game plan. Can’t do that; that’s not a recipe for winning. Same thing goes on the offensive end. Our shot selection down the stretch, execution needs to be tight. It’s tough to win in this league. That’s how it goes.”
On sustaining leads this season…
“You’d say it comes with maturity in a lot of ways. Unfortunately, maturity that means that it’s measured by time and experience. We got to find a way to not get too high when we’re up big and not get too low when you’re down big. Tonight was an example of that. You look at Orlando, they’ve been to the playoffs these last years. They got out to a good start this season until some guys went out. You knew they were going to keep coming. You see by (Nikola) Vučević playing 43 minutes, they were desperate for a win tonight and they hung in there. We can learn some things in the losses too, but it doesn’t feel good.”
On the smaller lineup at the end of the game…
“We thought it was a ball handling lineup and an execution lineup that we wanted to get to. You get to a certain point and you feel like now (the Magic) might get into a foul situation, so as that happened, that’s one of the reasons why we put (Jarred Vanderbilt) in there for a rebounder and a stop late in the game and they ended up fouling. I liked the group we had in there.”
TIMBERWOLVES FORWARD JADEN MCDANIELS
On moving on from this loss…
“I would say just continuing to come in and practice every day with that mindset… Something Coach always tells us is that we gotta put the full 48 minutes together so continuing to work on that. I feel like it will come along.
On the mood of the locker room…
“We don’t want to hang our heads or nothing like that. Just us not putting together the full 48 minutes. We know we can get better from this and just continuing to work and have that winning mindset.”
TIMBERWOLVES GUARD D’ANGELO RUSSELL
On what made it difficult to sustain the lead…
“I feel like I am saying the same thing every game. Just playing hard the whole game. At the end of the game when it gets tight or close we got to turn it up a notch and I don’t think we are there yet.
On how they can close out games…
“I think right now we just focus on controlling our character and controlling our demeanor. It is hard to bounce back from a game like that but, 60+ more games. So, you just gotta control your character and try to be better next time. There’s gotta be some kind of progression and I don’t think we lock in and stay in the same place. Just want to keep getting better day-by-day and game-by-game.”
(info courtesy of Wolves)