Think the final days of this lost Timberwolves season are meaningless? Think again.
It is anything but that. At stake in these final five days are the Western Conference's final playoff spot, a long-lost dream for the Wolves but still a very real possibility for a Utah Jazz team that is contesting Phoenix for the eighth and final spot, with Tuesday's game against the Suns in Salt Lake City looming monumental.
If the Jazz makes the playoffs, the Wolves will get Utah's first-round pick this summer in what is being called the deepest draft in years.
If the Jazz miss out, the Wolves will not have a first-round pick because they already traded theirs long ago to the Los Angeles Clippers, who in December shipped it off to New Orleans in the Chris Paul trade.
The Wolves could always use that pick to trade for a veteran player who fills pressing needs for a ballhandling, playmaking wing player or a shot-blocking center. Or they could go young once again trying to fill one of those needs.
If the Jazz prevails and the Wolves do indeed partake in the draft party come June, here are some of the early possibilities:
Austin Rivers, 6-4 shooting guard, Duke freshman, age 19.
One of the draft's most polarizing prospects, the son of Boston's Doc Rivers compensates for lack of prototypical shooting-guard height with long arms and a coach's son's smarts. Not a great athlete, but he's the kind of savvy ballhandler the Wolves seek. He could thrive having Kevin Love and Ricky Rubio carry the burden he had assumed in Duke's offense.
