Greetings.

The Wolves had a rather intense -- and rather long -- practice today before boarding a plane for Houston. They'll be tucked in bed probably before Houston returns from its Saturday night game at San Antonio.

Here are some items out of today's practice:

--Coach Kurt Rambis again praised the intensity of his second unit while challenging his starters to meet that level. "We clearly have to get off to better starts," Rambis said. "we have to do a better job of playing together. The intensity is not where it needs to be." Having said that, Rambis said he'd probably stick with his starting five.

--Like he did after the game, Rambis said he praised his team for the number of things it did right Friday. One of those things was definitely not the team's transition defense in the first half, when Atlanta reeled off 20 fast-break points. "We did some silly things," Rambis said. "One time, two of our players left a guy wide open; both thought the other guy was going to take him. i would guess at least 12 of those 20 were either we just didn't get back, we came up and pressed the ball when we were supposed to get back or left a guy (alone) under the basket. That's 12 of the 20 right there."

--But Rambis did like the ball pressure of his second unit, praising them for disrupting Atlanta's sets at times. Two of the key players on that unit are point guard Sebastian Telfair and shooting guard Corey Brewer. Telfair played a lot Friday mainly because he was playing well. Luke Ridnour is dealing with a sore left hamstring, Rambis said. But most of Telfair's minutes were due to his play.

That will bring up an interesting rotation question when Jonny Flynn returns from hip surgery, leaving the Wolves with three point guards.

I'll be writing about Brewer for tomorrow's paper, and Jerry will handle the team on the upcoming road trip to Houston, L.A. and Sacramento. Have a good day.