The Timberwolves have saved themselves from some disappointing losses of late thanks to strong fourth quarters. They had to attempt another fourth-quarter comeback Monday night from down 11, this time with Rudy Gobert out because of an ejection for a flagrant foul.
But the Wolves couldn’t get enough consistency at both ends of the floor in a 108-105 loss to Phoenix at Target Center. The loss ended a five-game win streak.
Anthony Edwards had a big scoring night with 40 points, but some of his teammates weren’t as proficient. Jaden McDaniels, Donte DiVincenzo, Naz Reid and Mike Conley combined to shoot 4-for-31, with Reid and McDaniels both missing tying three-pointers in the final minute.
Mark Williams scored 22 points for the Suns, who played without injured star Devin Booker.
“I thought a lot of them were decent looks,” coach Chris Finch said. “I thought there were a few moments in the game where we could’ve worked a little harder to get a better shot, but for the most part, I thought we had some decent looks.”
To Julius Randle, the Wolves finally had a game slip away after they were playing fire in a lot of their recent wins. They had to come back from double-digit deficits multiple times during their winning streak.
“Start of the first halves have not been great, and we’ve been easing ourselves into games and cover that with a good amount of energy in the third and fourth, winning that way,” said Randle, who finished with 21 points. “But we obviously — we aren’t playing our best basketball. We know we can’t consistently win like that. So, I think tonight we got a little bit of what we deserved from this. Just not playing a full 48 minutes.”
Gobert ejected, close to suspension
Gobert was ejected at the 7:59 mark of the third quarter after he committed a flagrant-2 foul on Williams, who had committed a flagrant foul on him earlier in the quarter. It marked four flagrant fouls on the season for Gobert, totaling five flagrant foul points (he receives two points for the flagrant-2).
