The Washington Wizards lost 131-109 to the Minnesota Timberwolves on Saturday night. After playing most of their opponents closely throughout the season, they still lost, this time in a blowout. You can watch the highlights above.
Stat of the Game: 33-21
Minnesota dished 33 assists compared to Washington’s 21. Since the Timberwolves led in assists, it’s no surprise that they shot 54.3 percent from the field while Washington shot just 38.9 percent.
It’s important to note that the Wizards are going to have games like these
Washington was projected to be one of the worst teams in the NBA this season by practically everyone. Besides injuries, this Washington roster is also more inexperienced. Sometimes, they are going to have a more positive mindset and keep things interesting. And other times, things just won’t click.
In a postgame news conference, Wizards head coach Scott Brooks didn’t think that there was a dropoff in effort. “We made a lot of mental mistakes, good thing most of them or all of them are going to be correctable,” he said.
One thing the Wizards will need to improve on is better communication on defense. Brooks mentioned that that is an area of weakness and that “We have a lot of quiet guys.” Washington has a lot of humble and rather quiet players like Bradley Beal and Rui Hachimura. I hope this wasn’t a call out in that respect.
But most importantly, the loss still shows us something that we knew all along: the Wizards have a long way to go before contending once again.
Isaiah Thomas is continuing to make an impact off the bench
Beal may have led Washington with 30 points, but Thomas was the veteran with a better all-around performance in my opinion since he dished 7 assists and grabbed 4 rebounds along with 16 points.
It’s unfortunate that Thomas’ efforts haven’t led to wins just yet, but I’m still confident that they will come.