TIMBERWOLVES NOTES
Player Notes
• In 33:12 minutes of play, Anthony Edwards finished with 27 points, eight rebounds and two assists, marking his 24th 20+ point game of the season and 12th game with 25+ points, which both lead all NBA rookies.
• D’Angelo Russell tallied 15 points in 20:22 of action off the bench. Of his 15 points, he scored 13 points in the first quarter on 5-of-5 shooting, including 3-of-3 from deep. The 13 points are a season-high for Russell in a first quarter.
• Ed Davis grabbed a season-high-tying 10 rebounds, all in the fourth quarter, in 10:20 of action off the bench. Tonight marked the third time in Davis’ career that he’s secured 10+ rebounds in a single quarter.
• Since entering the league in 2010-2011, Davis has grabbed 3,788 rebounds off the bench, accounting for the most rebounds by a bench player in the NBA during that time.
• Josh Okogie scored seven points and swiped four steals this afternoon, accounting for his fourth game of the season with at least four steals. His career high is five (2x, MR: Jan. 23 vs. New Orleans).
Team Notes
• Minnesota connected on 13 shots from beyond the arc this afternoon, good for the 47th game of the season connecting on 10+ threes.
• Led by Okogie’s four steals, the Timberwolves racked up 13 steals, the 24th time this season securing 10+ steals in a game.
Nets Notes
• Kevin Durant led the Nets in scoring this afternoon with 31 points, four rebounds and four assists, his 10th 30-point game of the season and his first since Jan. 31 at Washington (37 points).
POSTGAME QUOTES
TIMBERWOLVES HEAD COACH CHRIS FINCH
On why team performed the way they did…
“I think overall we were just flat and there could have been a lot of contributing factors, but at the end of the day, it is our job to come out and be better than that and it is a performance that we are just going to try to flush away and move on and get ready to play tomorrow.”
On the mindset the team had to have during a game like this…
“Just gotta set short term goals, let’s cut it to 15 by half, let’s cut it to whatever it might be. Let’s come out and play the right way, let’s get back to our principles, lots of little things that we can try to focus on. I mean I thought the group at the end there, they played hard, they moved the ball, we generated a ton of shots, we couldn’t make a single one but we were so far behind at that point anyway.”
TIMBERWOLVES GUARD JOSH OKOGIE
On the emotions related to the death of Daunte Wright…
“It has been very difficult. What hurts the most is when, like you said, you are vocal, you try to do things to help you try to stand for what’s right and then when nothing changes and the same thing happens, I think for me that is the most difficult part. ”
On his plans to use his platform…
“I always do. God has given me the gift to be in the position that I am to influence others, I always do that. Especially at a time like this, every time something like this happens, it just brings me back to, I don’t know when, but it was like a year ago, on Netflix, there was this stand-up that Chris Rock does, called ‘Tamborine’ and he says, he was obviously joking because he is a comedian, but obviously there is some truth to it. He was saying that some jobs just can’t have bad apples. Every time something like this happens, everybody says there is a lot of good police out there, we just have some bad apples. Every time I see that, I think about that script that Chris Rock wrote and it kind of went like this. So say, I am starting an airline business, JO airlines, and I say okay all of our pilots are pretty good but we have a few bad apples, would you buy a ticket at JO airlines? Probably not, right? I wouldn’t buy a ticket to my own airline if that was the kind of stigma going around. Same thing with hospitals. If I was going to a hospital, somebody needed an implant or something and they needed a procedure done, and they said look most of our doctors are good but we have a few bad apples, nobody would go to that hospital. They are just some jobs that you can’t have bad apples, especially when it is people’s livelihood that is at stake. So I think the police industry is the same thing, you can’t have bad apples. I am not here to say, Daunte Wright whether he was right or he was wrong in that situation, he shouldn’t have to pay the price of life or death for that. It has been so many situations where, I have been wrong, but I shouldn’t have to die, I shouldn’t have to be at the hands of a police officer to decide whether somebody lives or not. We played today, we lost, I probably ran five plays wrong today, I shouldn’t be killed for it, know what I am saying? The other team probably did something wrong, they shouldn’t be killed for it and it just hurts because all of this could have been prevented. During my research, so, in 2020 there was about 45 police officers who have been killed by gunfire and since January until about December 8th, there has been over 1,000 police officers who have killed civilians and when you take into account there was a whole pandemic where there wasn’t even a lot going on last year, that is kind of a high number and about 30% of those thousands of people were black. So about 300+ black people were killed by police officers last year and we are about 13% of the US population so that is entirely too much and that is definitely a problem and we have to hold people accountable for real though. I don’t want this to go where it is like okay it is just another episode, oh yeah, we are going to hold people accountable, we are going to wait until this dies down and then we are going to forget about it, we have to keep having this conversation because it is happening too frequent that a young 20-year-old kid gets killed not too far from where they are having a trial for another black man getting killed. Like that shouldn’t happen, it shouldn’t be that frequent where someone gets killed through the same thing that somebody else is on trial for, that just doesn’t make any sense. I know she, the officer, said that she thought it was a taser but that just shows you how, subconsciously when they see a black kid or anything, they are automatically a threat because you have your handgun to your right and your taser is supposed to be to your left and you have to cross your body to get your taser so you should know where your taser is and where your gun is. If you are going to arrest the kid, the training officer states you want to make an arrest near the trunk of the car so that person that you are arresting doesn’t really have that space to get back into the car to drive away and if that person was to drive away there is also rules stating that you don’t replace cardio for gunfire, meaning if someone takes off running, you don’t say ‘because I have to chase them, I can use my gun,’ that is not the case in the line of duty. I have done my research so I know that even regardless of what Duante did in that situation, it shouldn’t have been a situation where he is dead right now. Worst case scenario, you let him go, you got his tag, obviously you looked him up, you got his information to know there was even a warrant out for his arrest so you can go get him, the address is stated there where he lives, you can find him even if he gets away, that is the police’s job to police. It is just so sad, it really is so sad and it is even heartbreaking that it is happening in the community that I am playing in, because it could be anybody. I am not far removed from it, you know I have a family, little brother, older brothers, older sister, they are not far removed from it and it is just sickening, it is sad, it is disgusting and it just has to stop.”
TIMBERWOLVES GUARD D’ANGELO RUSSELL
On how he is feeling in this moment…
“My heart and prayers go out to everybody’s families that were touched in all the events you just named, but it is only so much you can say. We have a platform right here to bring awareness to it. There is nothing we can do from this conversation right now. I think the biggest thing is bringing awareness and then actually going out and doing things about it. So that is all I really have to say.”
On his minutes restriction being lifted…
“As far as the minute restriction, this will be the first time I got to play in a back-to-back scenario so we will see how I respond to that. My knee feels better than ever so I am confident with whatever the circumstance may be. As far as rotation and things of that sort, that is on coach, that is why he gets paid to be the coach, so I will let him kind of figure that out. Honestly, I don’t really care to be honest.”
(info courtesy of Wolves)