PORTLAND, Ore. _ The Timberwolves have played 10 games this season, but have only had their full roster of players begin and end the same game twice _ the first two games of the season.
Since then players have been in and out of the lineup for various reasons. Jimmy Butler has taken games off to rest, as he did for the third time Sunday. Andrew Wiggins was injured sat out three games and exited a fourth because of a quad contusion. Tyus Jones missed a game and currently point guards Jeff Teague and Derrick Rose are injured.
Coach Tom Thibodeau has had to test his team's depth early and often this season, and on Sunday, it just couldn't keep up with the Trail Blazers in a 111-81 loss, a loss that tied the most lopsided defeat of the Tom Thibodeau era.
There are nights when the depth has played well, like in a win over the Jazz on Wednesday and through three quarters of a loss to the Warriors on Friday in Oakland. Sunday was not one of those nights. Outside a few minutes of inspiration in the first quarter, the Wolves looked as though they had nothing in the tank to last the remaining three games of this road trip. The Wolves set the mark for most lopsided loss of the Thibodeau era with a 30-point loss to the Bucks on Oct. 26 at Target Center. They nearly bested (or worsted?) that on Sunday. Jusuf Nurkic had 19 points and 12 rebounds while Karl-Anthony Towns led the Wolves with 23 points.
The Blazers grabbed an early 9-2 lead on the Wolves, who had Josh Okogie filling in for Butler and Jones in for Teague and Rose in the starting lineup. The Wolves, behind Okogie and the offensive prowess of Karl-Anthony Towns, came back to grab a 21-19 lead of their own later in the quarter on an Okogie 3-pointer. Okogie was also able to add an electrifying dunk to his catalog early in the season, this time making a poster out of Nurkic.
That was one of the only times on the night the Wolves got the better of Nurkic and the Blazers.
The 7-footer found room to operate inside and had a double-double by the early minutes of the third quarter while Damian Lillard and CJ McCollum pitched in with 18 and 16 points, respectively.
But it was the second quarter where the Blazers inflicted most of their damage on the Wolves. There were few large outbursts of scoring, instead it was just a methodical grind for the potent Blazers, who instead limited the Wolves on the defensive end of the floor. First, the Blazers second unit helped them re-establish control, then the starters came back in to take the game away. It was 45-40 Blazers with 5:01 remaining in the quarter when the Blazers went on a 14-3 run over the next four minutes with Nurkic, Lillard and McCollum all chipping in to chip away the Wolves.
The Wolves scored just 18 points in the quarter, their third-worst showing in any quarter so far this season. They were only a point better in the third quarter when the Blazers outscored them 31-19.
Thibodeau decided to let the reserves play out the lost cause in the fourth quarter with another game coming Monday night in Los Angeles against the Clippers.
Despite the Wolves' defensive deficiencies last season and early this year, their offense has been efficient enough to keep pace with most opponents, like they did Friday against the Warriors, but after the first quarter the Wolves could get nothing going offensively. Perhaps that has to do with missing two point guards who help initiate the offense.
Their presence might not have mattered much Sunday. Maybe Butler's wouldn't have either. But the Wolves would probably have appreciated the chance to find out.
