Timberwolves 108, Heat 91
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"I thought overall we were pretty good defensively. Both Wally and KG shot the ball extremely well... The last couple days, our guys who've been coming off the bench have played really well... These are games that always scare you. You're playing against a team that is not going to be in the playoffs, but they always come out and play hard."

"We can get things going. We've been pretty good as far as scoring at home. When we move the ball — when we distribute the basketball — we can be pretty effective. You just can't hold the ball against these guys. We didn't hold the ball very much tonight. We moved the ball pretty well."

"We've been more aggressive (defensively). It's been something we've been working on a little bit... We've been rotating more. The thing that's a little misleading with us is we're 18th in the league in points given up, but we're eighth in the league in field-goal percentage (defense) — which is probably more of an indication of how good your defense is... I think that's been the biggest accomplishment from a year ago."


"Games like this, you've got to take care of business and play well. We did a good job of putting it away early. Miami plays hard, but they're a little bit down with all their injuries this year, and we did a good job against them."

"It's just maturity. We're getting better as a team, and more mature as players. Coaches are trusting us more to step up and play well in games like this. We've lost some games like this in previous years, and I think we've learned from that. That's a good sign, that we are learning and we are getting better year after year."


"I don't want to pace myself. I like to play full throttle for 48 minutes (or) as long as I'm out there. That's my style of play and my game. I don't like to pace myself. I think that would take away from my game and the way I can help this team."

"We definitely want homecourt advantage. We just have to keep taking each game game-by-game — playing with focus. Tonight it was like a must-win. That team plays hard, so we wanted to come out with a mess of energy. That's what we have to do from this point on."

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"We've just absolutely lost any kind of defensive disposition. We're just not taking any pride as a team defensively. I don't think we're giving up. We're giving effort, but there's a fine line between playing with passion and desire."

"I think Garnett deserves the MVP. I think a number of guys deserve the MVP. I feel Garnett has been this good for three years. I think Flip has done a great job, Wally is scoring and Troy Hudson was a great pickup for them."


"This just wasn't a good effort. I think once we finally got it right out there, KG was making shots and Wally got hot. Defensively it wasn't there. Our poor execution and huge amount of turnovers in the first quarter killed us. We didn't give ourselves a chance."


"We have to keep playing hard. We've taken on a lot of top contenders lately. They're playing with great urgency, and we need to do the same. We've also taken on some top players of late than can really wear you down. Tonight we had KG, right after we had McGrady — and the night before was Vince Carter. These are guys playing at a high level. You just try to slow them down."

"He (Garnett) made some tough shots, and the team just started to feed off him. He draws so much attention that you tend to forget about the other guys. We can't let that happen. Too many other players are beating us out there."