WASHINGTON _ Every time a glimmer of optimism emerges in the Timberwolves season, a road trip comes along sap their souls.
On Sunday, the Wolves concluded a three-game trip with a 135-121 loss to the Wizards, a team who is without one of its best player in John Wall and has fading hopes of making the playoffs. Like their other games on this three-game trip, it was a game the Wolves could have won, but their defense failed them when it mattered most.
Karl-Anthony Towns was brilliant again for the Wolves, scoring 28 and grabbing 10 rebounds, but the Wizards had three players who finished with more than 20 points _ Bobby Portis (26), Bradley Beal (22) and Jabari Parker (22).
The Wolves entered this week with renewed playoff hopes after winning four of five games. But when they boarded the team plane following a win Monday against Sacramento, those hopes stayed behind to freeze in the Minnesota winter.
You can file this 0-3 trip, which featured losses at Atlanta and Indiana, in the trash alongside a few other trips the Wolves have taken. There was an 0-3 trip in early February that allowed others in the Western Conference to gain ground on the Wolves in the Western Conference playoff race. The Wolves entered a four-game trip in early December 9-3 since the Jimmy Butler trade, only to have Robert Covington miss the first game of that West Coast swing. It was the start of Covington's knee issues this season and an 0-4 trip for the Wolves that preceded Tom Thibodeau's ouster.
Then there was a winless five-game trip at the beginning of the season, the one that put the Wolves in a 4-9 hole and caused them to deal Butler.
The road has been bumpy for the Wolves, to say the least.
The Wolves made a concerted effort to get the ball to Dario Saric in the opening minutes, as Saric scored the first seven points for the Wolves after not scoring more than seven points in his previous four games. It was after that when Towns got involved in the game and began to put on an offensive clinic. The Wizards tried to double Towns on every touch, but Towns was able to pass out of it effectively for four assists in the first half. Plus, he was still able to get his scoring wise, going 8 of 11 for 17 points in the opening half.
But the Wolves didn't do much to prevent Washington from scoring along with them. The Wizards had 15 second-chance points in this first quarter as Beal went for 12 and Washington led 40-36. In the second quarter, the Wolves were able to grab a small lead thanks to Towns and strong bench play from rookie Keita Bates-Diop, the second round pick out of Ohio State, who was 3-for-3 for six points. The Wolves led 64-62 at halftime despite shooting only 1 of 10 from 3-point range.
The Wolves found themselves in a bit of a hole after the third quarter, when a pair of ex-Bulls did some damage against another team full of ex-Bulls. Jabari Parker had 10 points in the third quarter while Bobby Portis added eight and the Wizards extended their lead to 11 and led 97-87 headed into the fourth. It didn't help that the Wolves were just 2 of 17 from 3-point range through three quarters and one of their best defenders, Josh Okogie, spent most of the quarter on the bench in foul trouble.
But the Wolves lacked the defensive presence to make a comeback in the fourth as Washington kept scoring at will, a familiar theme for the Wolves this season.
