Wolves Lose 13th Straight
March 22, 2010

As the games dwindle down to a precious few in the current NBA season, the Minnesota Timberwolves continued their relentless pace of gathering up as many ping pong balls as possible in the league’s lottery. Minnesota’s latest effort was accomplished Monday night before a crowd generously announced at 14,554 when the Wolves fell to the Toronto Raptors by the score of 106 to 100.

In doing so, the Timberwolves accomplished a pair of dubious achievements. Minnesota not only lost its 13th game in succession, the team now is 0-12 in its last dozen meetings with the Raptors.

A clear indicator to the direction in which the Wolves were heading occurred just before halftime Monday night. With the game tied at 45, Minnesota’s Lionel Hollins committed a foolish foul with only 00.3 seconds left on the clock. A missed free throw by Chris Bosh was followed by a basket. Toronto had the lead, causing a press row veteran accustomed to Minnesota’s track record this season to mutter, “Well, this one’s over.”

And it was.

For the game, Bosh overcame six turnovers to score 21 points and grab 10 rebounds. His team owns the No. 8 spot in the NBA East, but they are lucky to have that after dropping 10 of their previous 13 games.

In the third period, Toronto took advantage of nine quick points from Bosh and used a 20-7 run to secure a 14-point lead. And while the Timberwolves responded with a run of their own and closed the gap to five, by the early minutes of the fourth quarter Toronto quickly built the lead back to 12.

Corey Brewer did score with a breakaway dunk to cut Toronto's lead to two, 91-89, with just over four minutes to play.

But Minnesota was unable to get defensive stops. In other words, they forgot how to play defense (if they ever knew). Other than a traveling call on Bosh, Toronto only failed to score once in their final nine possessions.

“Our half-court defense just let us down,” Minnesota coach Kurt Rambis moaned after the game. “We couldn’t find ways to get stops. And when you are behind you have to get stops. In late game situations we gave up second chance opportunities, that really hurt us."

Toronto improved to one game over .500 (35-34) and Minnesota dropped to one game under .200 (14-57). Al Jefferson scored 22 points and rookie Wayne Ellington added 17 in the losing effort.