MINNEAPOLIS – The “Thibs Bowl.’’
“Jimmy Palooza’’
Wednesday’s meeting between the Timberwolves and Bulls needed to be called something. After all, “a good basketball game’’ definitely wouldn’t be accurate.
But that’s where these two franchises are these days: Spinning in mud in two separate conferences, and linked together because of their mutual love affair of making bad organizational decisions.
It started with former coach Tom Thibodeau, who guided the Bulls back to relevance post-Michael Jordan Era, only to be fired because he wouldn’t be an organizational puppet. The Timberwolves hired him, only to see their junior varsity franchise end a 13-year playoff drought under Thibodeau. But when losing is all you know, it’s the habit you fall back into.
Out was Thibodeau, and in was 33-year-old Ryan Saunders, the son of former long-time Timberwolves coach/basketball operations executive Flip Saunders.
And just like that back to life in the draft lottery.
Just like both organizations thought they could move on from Jimmy Butler. All the All-Star did was take each team to the playoffs in consecutive years – which is also the last time either team sniffed the postseason by the way.
The Bulls sent Butler to Minnesota in hopes of jumpstarting this rebuild, getting back Zach LaVine, Kris Dunn and the draft rights to Lauri Markkanen.
It’s now Year 3 of the rebuild.
The Timberwolves then sent Butler to Philadelphia last season, deciding that long-term contracts for Andrew Wiggins and Karl-Anthony Towns were higher priorities than investing in an elite two-way.
So yes, there it was at the Target Center for all to dare see.
A 21-win Bulls team losing to a 19-win Minnesota team 115-108.
“Yeah I guess,’’ Bulls coach Jim Boylen said, when asked if the two organizations will remain linked until one of them can start distinguishing themselves once again. “Yeah, they had Jimmy here, and obviously we’ve got Lauri and Zach from that deal.’’
Coincidentally, Boylen and Saunders do have some common ground, getting the job last year during coaching changes, and having very few wins to show for it since. Saunders was asked about that, and sounded like a guy hell-bent on focusing the attention on anything but his record.
“I never think about that on my end,’’ Saunders said, when asked about defending his win-loss record and his place as an NBA coach. “It’s always been, and I’ve said this from Day 1, it’s always been about daily growth. If the record doesn’t match to where you want to be, you’ve got to stick to a process too on where you want to go if you want to have sustained success, and we feel very confident in what we’re doing.’’
The Bulls allowed them to feel confident at least on Wednesday, getting outrebounded 43-39, and allowing them to shoot 44 percent from three.
The usually positive-spinning Boylen was far from that afterward, discounting the fact that Lauri Markkanen was returning from injury after 15 games off and Otto Porter Jr. was playing in his second game after missing 17 weeks.
“I don’t care who’s been out, who is working on a minutes restriction, I didn’t think we were tough enough tonight, and I didn’t like it,’’ Boylen said.
He admitted to calling out his team after, as well as challenging them moving forward.
“When you play your minutes, you need to play them with more physicality,’’ Boylen said. “I’m coaching my team, let me coach my team.’’
Veteran forward Thaddeus Young was asked about Boylen getting into them, and said the message was loud and clear.
“There’s some instances where we could be tough, there’s some instances where we are being tough,’’ Young said. “To me the team is trying, we’re playing as hard as we can.’’
