The Game
The Wolves find themselves back at home after a quick one-game road trip to Houston on Saturday.
Minnesota will be hosting an Oklahoma City squad that many figured would be in the lottery picture. Not so fast. Behind the leadership of Chris Paul and rise of Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, the Thunder find themselves at 22-17, good for seventh in the West and a full five games up from the eighth seed.
The Wolves, meanwhile, are 15-23, 11th in the West.
This is the second matchup between the two teams this season. The Wolves lost a heartbreaker to the Thunder 138-127 in overtime back on Dec. 6 in Oklahoma City.
The two teams will face off two more times after Monday night.
What: Wolves vs. ThunderWhen: 7 p.m. CT, Monday, Jan. 13Where: Target CenterWatch: Fox Sports NorthListen: 830 WCCOTickets
Lockdown Defense
Robert Covington is one of the best defenders in the entire NBA and he's proven that as of late. He’s the heart and soul of Minnesota’s defensive identity and he’s been absolutely huge over the last month for this team.
Since Dec. 15, Covington has averaged 2.23 steals and 1.23 blocks per contest – both marks lead the team during that stretch.
Without Karl-Anthony Towns in the lineup, Minnesota has had to rely on its defense more to win games. That doesn’t happen without Covington playing like he has.
Second-Year Soar
The Thunder acquired Gilgeous-Alexander this offseason as part of the Paul George trade. While you can’t dispute how good George is, you also can’t ignore how good SGA has been in his second season.
The former Kentucky guard is averaging 19.9 points, 5.3 rebounds and 2.7 assists per game while shooting 46.4 percent from the field and 33.6 percent from the 3-point line.
The thought going into the season was that you’d have to move Paul somehow to make room for Gilgeous-Alexander to develop. It turns out, they play just fine together and Gilgeous-Alexander has developed accordingly.
Injury Report:
Wolves: Towns (knee) and Jake Layman (toe) are out.
Thunder: Nerlens Noel (ankle) is questionable. Andre Roberson (knee) is out.
Projected Starters:
Wolves: PG—Napier, SG—Wiggins, SF—Martin, PF—Covington, C—Dieng
Thunder: PG—Paul, SG – Gilgeous-Alexander, SF – Ferguson, PF – Gallinari, C - Adams