The Wolves played on without Kevin Love and Andrei Kirilenko -- and Ricky Rubio, of course -- on Saturday in their Target Center preseason debut and overcame Chicago 82-75 with a decisive 24-15 fourth quarter.

After the game, they waived center/forward Phil Jones and guard Seth Tarver to get their roster to 18 players.

Neither player appeared in any of the three preseason games.

The Wolves must get to at least the maximum 15-player roster before their Nov. 2 season opener.

Love said missed tonight's game because he slept with his right arm extended over his bed on Friday night. When he awoke Saturday, he said he couldn't shoot the ball 10 feet because he had slept on it so awkwardly.

He also said he thinks it's only a "24-hour thing."

Without those two, Dante Cunningham and Chase Budinger started.

But the guys who won the game in the fourth quarter with a group that included J.J. Barea at point, Alexey Shved at shooting guard, Nikola Pekovic at center, Budinger at small forward and Lou Amundson at power forward.

Shved made two big threes that repelled the Bulls twice, extending the lead back to five points after Chicago had pulled within a bucket.

He scored 12 of his 15 points in the fourth.

"It's good to have two guys who can handle the ball," Rick Adelman said. "He got a good experience there. It's a different arena for him."

Pekovic played nearly 39 minutes after he played just the first quarter on Friday in Indianapolis.

And he had corresponding numbers for such big minutes: 16 points, 17 rebounds.

Those 17 rebounds are the most by a Timberwolf in a preseason game since Al Jefferson had that many in 2007.

Some other things:

* Brandon Roy again looked good, scoring 13 points on 3-for-7 shooting and handing out a team-high four assists even though he didn't play at all in the fourth quarter.

Adelman said he considered putting Roy back in to close out the game, but didn't because the group already on the floor was going well.

He added that he will do that here before the preseason schedule -- which has four games left -- is over.

* Amundson and Cunningham continue to live up to Adelman's description of them as "energy guys."

Cunningham blocked Kirk Hinrich's shot from behind early in Saturday's game after he recorded six blocks Friday against the Pacers and Amundson provided the punctuation on this victory in the final three minutes when he rejected a Taj Gibson block attempt at one end and then providing an emphatic putback for a nine-point lead at the other end.

* Bulls forward Jimmy Butler played all 48 minutes, in a PRESEASON game.

* The Wolves will take Sunday off after playing back-to-back games Friday and Saturday and come back Monday for practice before playing an Israeli team on Tuesday night at Target Center.

I'll be back to blog at you on Monday.