Season Record: 17-30

We've been solid lately, beating the teams we "should beat." However, we still struggle against the upper tier teams. The Hawks are borderline, but they are still better than us. Also, it's the second night of a back-to-back for us, and we've got to travel back to MPLS tonight. I think it will be a letdown game. It's due to happen, and Atlanta is good.


PREDICTION:

Wolves 83 - Hawks 95

No Joe Johnson, but possibly Al Horford. I guess that's better... maybe. Either way, Hawks don't have "great" defense, so I think we can steal this one. Bibby trying to guard Bass should be interesting to see...

Gray Wolves: 93
Red Birds: 86

Joe Johnson isn't playing?

If not, then new prediction:


Wolves 88 - Hawks 92

No Johnson (and maybe no Chris Paul when we go to New Orleans this week)

No Atlanta


Hungry Wolves 102 - Fresh Meat 99

Horford is known for being a beast on the boards, but klove is light years ahead of him!
No Johnson, no problem...
Wolves112
Birds103

SlimPickens wrote:



That is just absurd...

Well, yes, light years ahead of him is a little absurd, but:
Horford averages 10 more minutes a game and only .7 more rebounds per game.
and has a years league experience on love.

Don't get me wrong, Horford's a great player, but Love has the positioning skills, footwork and knack for grabbing the ball that is just ridiculous....

Should be interesting if Love does start tonight. Word is that Smith was injured yesterday so he might sit tonight. That will be an awesome match up.

I'm really not happy about Joe Johnson being out.
A) I wanted to see him play
I wanted to see this team beat a playoff team at full strength.

BTW... Streak For Cash on espn has this game. Being a lover of all things inverse jinx I jumped on the Hawks pick.

Wolves: 98
Hawks: 105

Marvin Williams - 4 or 5 threes
Josh "The Wolves have no Answer" Smith - he looks like a big time guy tonight

The Hawks have too much athleticism for the Wolves on the back end of a tough win last night.

I'm 75% certain Rhino isn't playing tonight. McHale labeled him as "pretty dinged up" and he's suffering from at least bruised ribs. That's what I've heard.

No Joe Johnson? Whats wrong with him? Vegas has the Wolves by 2. With no Joe, I would take that.

Sharp Eyes: 93
Sharp Bites: 99

FALCONS: 91
VIKINGS: 94

College Wolf wrote:



Not bad, only off by 2 points for each team. See Pants, I WAS (almost) RIGHT!!!!!!1!!!!!!1


http://scores.espn.go.com/nba/boxscore?gameId=290204016


It was a good game, after what initially looked like a monster borefest. We were down 17 at one point and looked completely disinterested in playing at all. I mean, we had freakin 37 points at halftime! The Hawks are good, but I was surprised how much they were able to run over us without Joe Johnson. It was really depressing to be honest. No one wanted to make free throws down the stretch, and I honestly thought we had a chance to steal this one when we pulled within 2. Alas, it was not to be.

Marvin Williams is good. I think he would be a solid building block/addition to our team this off-season. That is, if he even wants to sign here as a free agent. We could throw some money at him though. We desperately need a long, agile SF like him.

I thought Josh Smith would do more damage tonight, but Bibby burned us enough to make up for it.

I can't believe I'm saying this, but the only reason the Wolves were in the game was because of Love, Miller, and (gulp) McCants (?!?!) Love was a beast with 9 offensive boards and some nice scoring down low. Miller finally(!) shot 10 field goals, making 7 of them for 17 points. 3 of 6 from deep was finally nice. And McCants. Man. That was the most inspired game I think I've ever seen him play. How surprising was that? McCants was a team high +9, when no one else was in the positives for plus/minus. He was 4 of 7 for 10 points and 4 boards, although he did have 3 fouls and 2 turnovers in only 15 minutes.

That defensive stop by McCants like 2 minutes or so into the fourth quarter was probably the best defensive play I've EVER seen him make. He stayed in front of Acie Law by himself out on the perimeter, and then blocked the shot causing a 24 second shot clock violation. It was amazing, especially by McCants standards. The downside is that now we know he has the tools to play good defense, he just has never chosen to do so in the past.

Fairly typical game from Al, although it seemed like they were trying to force it to him down the stretch.

For the statheads: The Wolves shot a ridiculous 22 more shots than the Hawks, mostly because of their astounding offensive rebounding. The Wolves had an OREB% of 33.93% (nabbing 19 of their 56(!) misses. The Hawks OREB% paled in comparison at 21%. What also did the Wolves in was putrid overall shooting. The Wolves were 36.4% from the field, compared to 50% for the Hawks. Even worse, thanks to 8 of 30 from deep, the Wolves eFG% was only 31.8%, which is nearly unheard of. The Hawks went for an eFG% of 47.7%, in comparison.

Foye, Gomes, and Telfair all just had monumentally awful games. Unfortunately, this all happened in the SAME game. That's partly the reason we lost. I mean, Foye was 4 of 19. Gomes was 1 of 10. Telfair 0 for 9. They combined for 18 points, 10 rebounds, 7 assists, 6 turnovers, and 8 fouls in 109 minutes. That is beyond awful from 60% of your starting rotation. It's amazing that we were even in this game.

Well, we've lost 4 of our last 5. Again the Wolves lose to a legit team, despite the fact that we've been beating all the teams we "should" beat. It makes for exciting basketball, but it's kind of depressing in a way. What worries me is that it's the path to perpetual mediocrity. I hope they can prove me wrong.

C-Dub I don't share your optimism about that game but I do agree with you on a lot of points. Gomes, and Telfair were horrible and should have stayed home. I will give credit were credit was do and that is Mccants played a great half of a game. I am glad I didn't go because I would have had to listen to the clowns behind the basket with the Mccants jerseys saying I told you so. Anyhow we got beat without there best playe,r but it was the second game of a back to back.

I was feeling ambitious/motivated, so I made my last comment into a "Mini-Musings." Check it out on the front page if you want, but it's no different than what I just wrote in the forums. I guess it does have a picture. Woohoo.

www.twolvesblog.com/200902051876/minneso...-vs-hawks-20409.html