Last season, three matchups between the Houston Rockets and the Minnesota Timberwolves ended in a combined score of 350-351. There were no three trumps, with Houston’s lone largest margin of victory in the series (by 5 points).
The two defeats were of different orders of population, but. Both came to the end of the season and basically Houston had no chance of holding onto the benefits in the first round of the playoffs. It turns out that having those first two games in Houston didn’t really hurt the Los Angeles Lakers crowd at 326 TS%* over those first two games (*all stats are approximate, but seriously the Lakers couldn’t miss in Games 1 and 2).
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It was the first loss where Houston held a 13-point overtime lead. It was easily the worst first two minutes of extra time I’ve ever seen. Then followed a devastating three-minute overtime period as Minny went on a furious 15-0 run to win. It was yet another in a long series of recent games that the Houston team has fallen.
The T-wolves enter without Anthony Edwards, who is recovering from arthroscopic knee surgery, but there was enough early success to prove the concept of the Ant-LaMelo Ball pairing. It certainly looks like they can work together, and the further ascension of Jaden McDaniels gives them enough cover to wait two months for Ant’s return.
The Wolves also have Thaddeus Young this generation in veteran Rockets killer Jonathan Kuminga. He is playing well this season so I expect another career night from him against a team that always shows up to play.
Indicia-off*
7:30 pm CT
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Injury Report
Rockets
Clint Chapel: GTD
Steven Adams: E
Timberwolves
Anthony Edwards: OUT
Terrence Shannon Jr.: GTD
Donte DiVincenzo: E
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Rockets: 1
Adversaries: 2
The look He has given us what we can
Saturday night in Phoenix in the sun