Forget about continuity: Timberwolves struggling on defense

Continuity isn’t going to save this version of the Timberwolves.

Through five games, fans, pundits and the team would be wise to eliminate it from their vocabulary.

What’s clear is this is not the 2023-24 team, which had the No. 1 defense in the league. It is not last season’s, which had the No. 6 defense.

Despite almost every regular rotation player being on the roster a season ago, this Wolves team has to figure out its own identity, its own way of playing defense.

And relying on the muscle memory continuity was supposed to create has turned out to be nothing but a crutch. It inhibits the Wolves from asking the hard questions and making the necessary adjustments to become the team it knows it can become, especially on defense.

“You’re not going to come into the year Western Conference finalists,” Mike Conley said after Wednesday’s loss to the Lakers. “You’re 0-0 to start, just like everybody else.”

And now the Wolves are 2-3.

At times, they have. Like opening night in Portland, when they held the Trail Blazers to 19 points in the fourth quarter of a win. They finally buckled down on defense in the fourth quarter Wednesday against the shorthanded Lakers and came all the way back from a 20-point deficit before Austin Reaves hit the game winner at the buzzer.

About the only areas the benefits of continuity are showing are on offense for Julius Randle, who’s off to an All-Star level start on offense (26.6 points, 5.4 assists per game) and Jaden McDaniels, who has picked up the slack well in Edwards’ absence. McDaniels continues to show, as he did last season when the Wolves had many injuries, he has an expanded offensive game that can thrive when he has the ball in his hands.

Other than that? The Wolves are disorganized on the defensive side of the ball, with a rating of 25th.

“Two years ago was a different team, different personnel,” Conley said. “Obviously, you’re going to miss different guy’s skillsets. But we have the guys here that can do the same things those guys are doing. A lot of them are just younger. We’re trying to get guys adjusted to that and adjusted to the speed of how we play. And they’ll get there.”

That’s where continuity hasn’t helped. Players like Kyle Anderson and Nickeil Alexander-Walker were integral to the Wolves’ defensive identity. The Wolves are asking young players like Terrence Shannon Jr. and Rob Dillingham to step into larger roles while trying to maintain that same defensive standard. Maybe this is one byproduct of Edwards’ absence — the team and he can see just how much they need him to buckle down on the defensive end this season.

“As a whole, the other guys that have been here the entire time, there’s no excuse for us not to be playing at that level,” Conley said. “If you can point the finger at anybody, it’s got to be the group that’s been here and knows what we’re doing and knows how we’re supposed to play.”