Timberwolves find their legs in second half, demolish Mavericks 121-87

For the first half of their 121-87 victory over the shorthanded Mavericks, the Timberwolves played down to their level of competition.

Against a Dallas team that was without Kyrie Irving and Luka Doncic for the second time in its two visits to Target Center, the Wolves showed the same lack of energy that led to recent bad losses against Charlotte and San Antonio. But this night would not end up like those others.

The Wolves didn’t revert back to being the worst version of themselves and rallied in the second half for their second consecutive win to stay atop the Western Conference standings. In the process, they set a new season-best for points allowed.

“We felt a little weird at first, I guess,” said center Naz Reid, who had 12 points. “But we kind of ramped it up and started playing the right way. … I think we just locked in and became ourselves. I think that’s something that we can do throughout the whole game. An 82-plus game season, you have moments like that where you’ve got to find yourself and lock in.”

Karl-Anthony Towns provided the firepower on offense after a sleepy start for both teams. His 29 points on 11-for-15 shooting was a needed dose of efficient offense after the teams opened the night shooting a combined 2-for-18 from three-point range.

Towns scored 10 in the second quarter to give the Wolves a 52-48 lead and 11 in the third as the Wolves finally pulled away on the strength of their defense, which held Dallas to 41% shooting, 21% from three-point range.

Anthony Edwards, who received a $40,000 fine from the league for his comments about the officiating following Monday’s win over Oklahoma City, had nine points as he seemed more focused on the defensive end of the floor than his offense. It was tied for his second-lowest scoring output of the season in a game he didn’t get hurt first. He helped limit Dallas guard Tim Hardaway Jr. to 14 points on 5-for-16.

On offense, Dallas focused on double teaming him, and coach Chris Finch said Edwards was making the right decisions to get his teammates going, even if there were other avenues for him to score throughout the game.

“He has to also continue to stay aggressive and find different opportunities within the flow of the game,” Finch said. “Maybe some in transition, maybe cut, more catch-and-shoots, that kind of stuff. But he did a really good job of not forcing anything into the teeth of their defense.”

But against this version of the Mavericks, which was also without center Dereck Lively, the Wolves didn’t need Edwards going at full throttle.

“Don’t look at people who were missing, look at the team and just find a different way to win, and it just presents a new challenge and different problems,” Towns said. “Obviously they were missing big pieces of their team, but we got to go out and find a way to win.”

BOXSCORE: Wolves 121, Dallas 87

NBA standings

Rudy Gobert pitched in 17 points while Mike Conley returned from hamstring tightness to score 10.

Wednesday was a refreshing easy victory for the Wolves after last week contained more than enough drama in failing to dispatch teams near the bottom of the standings.

Finch said he thought the team looked “heavy-legged” in the first half, which he said can happen after a long road trip (the Wolves just completed four games away). They found their legs eventually.

“One thing you’ve gotta preach when you’re a coach, you’ve got to play to your standard regardless of who the opponent is,” Finch said. “Defensively, we didn’t do that much in the first half. I thought we were just a little slow, but we picked it up in the second half just enough to be able to impose ourselves on the game.”