Fans make training camp opener a slam dunk

I think Wolves president of basketball operations and head coach Flip Saunders as a future as a concert promoter.

"I don't know about that," Saunders said after 90 minutes of "Dunks after Dark,'' the official kickoff of Timberwolves' training camp. "But it was a good show.''

That it was. This idea of having a college-styled midnight madness-like opening to the Wolves training camp here in Mankato at the stroke of midnight Tuesday was nothing if not well-attended and….

….Loud.

By 10 p.m. hoards of fans – almost entirely students – were gathering outside the Taylor Center on the Minnesota State-Mankato campus, waiting to get in. At 11 p.m. the doors opened and, with extraordinarily loud music blaring, those fans rushed the arena to grab their seat and a free T-shirt. The Wolves opened camp with some warmups, a few drills, a handful of scrimmages and a short display of dunking.

"Hey, great energy and support from the fans here in Mankato," Saunders said. "It's nice when they come out. Glen (owner Glen Taylor) has been such a big supporter of this city, it's nice to have people come out. Our team came down and put on a little show for them."

By the time the clock struck midnight there had to have been at least 3,500 people, and perhaps more, in Bresnan Arena, which holds something north of 4,500.

After a dunk-heavy warmup period, Young spoke briefly with the crowd ("Are you ready?'' he asked. "We're ready, too. We're ready to take on the season.") Then the three teams were announced:

Team 1: Rubio, Chase Budinger, Andrew Wiggins, Robbie Hummel, Nikola Pekovic and Kyrylo Fesenko.

Team 2: Mo Williams, LaVine, Corey Brewer, Young, Gorgui Dieng and Brady Heslip.

Team 3: J.J. Barea, Kevin Martin, Shabazz Muhammad, Glen Robinson, Ronny Turiaf and Anthony Bennett.

Then the scrimmages:

In the second scrimmage Martin hit all four of his three-pointers and scored 14 of his team's 28 points in a one-point victory over LaVine's team.

In the third scrimmage Rubio's three-pointer with 1.9 seconds ended the scrimmage in a 22-22 tie.

Final standings:

Team 3: 1-0-1

Team 2: 1-1-0

And, then, finally, a few dunks. Among the highlights: a 360 by LaVine; a windmill by Wiggins; a through-the-legs by LaVine.

Impressions?

--It was interesting that the first points in the first scrimmage tonight was a Wiggins dunk from Rubio's alley-oop pass.

-- Martin is in mid-season shooting form.

-- Muhammad not only looks like a new person, he runs and jumps line one, too.

And early Tuesday morning there was a lot of energy in Bresnan Arena.

"I didn't know it would be that crazy," Saunders said. "When they first came running in it was quite a sight. But it was good. Our guys got into it, got in a good sweat. ''