Thaddeus Young, Nets outgun shorthanded Timberwolves
The Brooklyn Nets got their second consecutive win with a 122–106 victory over the Minnesota Timberwolves on Monday Night.
It was the first meeting between the Nets and T-Wolves since the Kevin Garnett–Thaddeus Young trade. Garnett did not play due to an ailing knee injury. Only eight Timberwolves players were available to play with Ricky Rubio, Nikola Pekovic, Gary Neal, Anthony Bennett, Shabazz Muhammad, Robbie Hummel and Kevin Garnett all sitting out.
The undermanned Timberwolves stuck around for the first quarter of the game, but the Nets quickly pulled away behind Joe Johnson‘s team high 22 points and Bojan Bogdanovic‘s 21 points off the bench. Thaddeus Young added in 19 points for the Nets in his first game against Minnesota since being dealt to Brooklyn.
For the Timberwolves, Kevin Martin had a game high 23 points, but it was not enough to lead the Timberwoves to victory, as the team fell to 14-52, the worst record in the Western Conference.
The Nets did a majority of their damage from the paint, where they scored a franchise-record 78 points. Coming into today’s game, the Nets averaged 49.2 points in the paint following the All-star break (first in the NBA).
Brooklyn is now 2.5 games out of the 8th playoff spot in the Eastern Conference with just 17 games left in the regular season. Four teams are currently ahead of the Nets in the playoff standings: the Indiana Pacers, Miami Heat, Boston Celtics, and the Charlotte Hornets. Only two of these teams will secure the 7th and 8th playoff spots.