George’s Take: Rudy Gobert to Minnesota turns them into a top Western Conference team

By George Velky
UConn Dai­ly Cam­pus
Sept. 21, 2022

Last year’s Min­neso­ta Tim­ber­wolves had one of the most excit­ing sea­sons for the fran­chise in over a decade. Though they exit­ed in the first round of the play­offs, they com­pet­ed in a fierce series against a tal­ent­ed Mem­phis squad.  In the months since a block­buster trade for Rudy Gob­ert and a sol­id draft class has left the Min­neso­ta fans with some­thing they haven’t had in years: Expec­ta­tions. 

Rudy Gob­ert has been one of the league’s best cen­ters since enter­ing the league in 2013 from France. He’s made a name for him­self on defense, win­ning defen­sive play­er of the year three times while play­ing for Utah, demon­strat­ing his val­ue. 

For the Tim­ber­wolves, who have won only three play­off games since 2003, acquir­ing Gob­ert is a big deal. Min­neso­ta gave up a lot for Gob­ert; four first round picks and five play­ers includ­ing guards Patrick Bev­er­ly, Malik Beasly, and Lean­dro Bol­maro, as well as for­ward Jarred Van­der­bilt, and the rights to rook­ie cen­ter Walk­er Kessler. 

Many have said that the Tim­ber­wolves paid too much for the elite French cen­ter. Either way, the result is a top notch start­ing five that now con­tains one of the most excit­ing front­court duos in the game of Rudy Gob­ert and Karl-Antho­ny Towns.

Towns and Gob­ert are each elite big men in their own right. Both are top five cen­ters in the league and now they’ll be play­ing togeth­er. Though they each play at the high­est pedi­gree, their style of play couldn’t be more dif­fer­ent. Karl-Antho­ny Towns, or “KAT”, has been one of the best offen­sive big men in recent his­to­ry. He shoots a high per­cent­age from three and even won the three point con­test at All Star Week­end this past year. Gob­ert has made a name for him­self on the defen­sive end. He is feared through­out the league and is known as one of the top shot block­ers around.

Gob­ert and Towns will com­ple­ment each oth­er like peanut but­ter and jel­ly. Towns played well last year, but he strug­gled defen­sive­ly and with foul trou­ble. Now the bur­den of being the defen­sive anchor is off Towns and onto Gob­ert, who has played that role his entire career. The Tim­ber­wolves orga­ni­za­tion will move KAT to the pow­er for­ward and play him in a more offen­sive role, where he thrives. With Gob­ert down low, Towns will have an oppor­tu­ni­ty to play from the perime­ter and put up more shots. At the same time, he will stay health­i­er with­out hav­ing to muck up his game in the paint and strug­gle for rebounds, also adding to his fatigue. Rudy has that cov­ered. On defense, Gob­ert will pro­tect the paint the way he always has. This will cre­ate few­er sit­u­a­tions in which Towns descends into foul trou­ble. All while pro­vid­ing the team with ener­gy and momen­tum. 

Aside from the two all-star big men, The Tim­ber­wolves have an excit­ing start­ing back­court with for­mer all-star D’Angelo Rus­sell and Antho­ny Edwards. Rus­sell has strug­gled with con­sis­ten­cy through­out his career, but when he plays well, he’s as good as the league’s oth­er pre­mier point guards. Edwards is enter­ing his third year in the league. In his first two, he has devel­oped into one of the most excit­ing play­ers to watch. He has tak­en a major step since he was draft­ed first over­all in 2020. Edwards has some of the rawest tal­ent in the league and though he is not quite there yet, fans and ana­lysts can’t help but envi­sion a Dwane Wade type career for the young star.

Besides the tal­ent­ed back­court, Min­neso­ta has anoth­er young, ath­let­ic piece with for­ward Jaden McDaniels. McDaniels came to the Wolves in the same draft as Edwards and has improved in the same fash­ion. McDaniels has become a top three-point option for the team. He can play either the three or the four and when he is on the court, he brings great inten­si­ty and good ath­leti­cism to the line­up. 

Though The Tim­ber­wolves trad­ed away the rights to rook­ie cen­ter Walk­er Kessler, they were able to keep their oth­er two young studs from this past draft. Min­neso­ta draft­ed the ath­let­ic for­ward Wen­dell Moore from Duke, as well as a tal­ent­ed Joshua Minott from Mem­phis. Though Minott was draft­ed a round lat­er than Moore, it was the sec­ond rounder who showed out in the sum­mer league and looks to make a large imme­di­ate impact. 

Though the Tim­ber­wolves lost some nice depth pieces in the trade with Utah, they were able to keep their entire start­ing core with the team and even gave them­selves an upgrade. The start­ing five they boast: D’Angelo Rus­sell, Antho­ny Edwards, Jaden McDaniels, Karl-Antho­ny Towns, and Rudy Gob­ert, is a group that could chal­lenge any oth­er start­ing five in the west. What they lack in expe­ri­ence, they make up for with raw tal­ent. If Min­neso­ta can play to their full poten­tial, don’t be sur­prised if they make a deep play­off run. 

Ulti­mate­ly, the team will be one of the most enter­tain­ing groups to watch in the upcom­ing sea­son. And with the franchise’s depress­ing play­off his­to­ry, the Wolves have one edge that sep­a­rates them from every oth­er team–they have some­thing to prove. Look for Tim­ber­wolves to fin­ish as a top–five seed in the West–They have the tal­ent to do it. And at the very least, look for some more jaw drop­ping high­light slam dunks from Edwards and elite work in the paint from the league’s newest duo.