The Timberwolves 25th season ends tonight and the franchise won’t qualify for the playoffs. The club hasn’t participated in post-season games since 2004 and that disappoints owner Glen Taylor who plans on asking plenty of questions during the next couple of weeks.
With a roster of young talent led by All-Star forward Kevin Love, and the addition of new players such as forward Corey Brewer and guard Kevin Martin, the Wolves appeared ready to break the playoff drought when the season started last fall. “It was a must for this year (making the playoffs),” Taylor told Sports Headliners.
Injuries slowed the club’s progress. Most notable was the ankle injury of center Nikola Pekovic who has only been able to play in 54 of 81 games. Other than Love the 28-year-old Pekovic is the team’s best front court scorer and among the NBA’s premier low post offensive players (averages 17.4 points and 8.7 rebounds). Pekovic, who reportedly signed a five-year $60 million contract before last season, has a history of injuries and missing games.
But Taylor said in addition to the team’s injuries contributing to not making the playoffs, he is troubled by the many close games the Wolves lost. The club often was ineffective in the fourth quarter. Taylor intends to explore why. “Is that the responsibility of the staff and the coaches? How much of that is the players? I am going to dig further into that.”
Taylor didn’t offer an answer when asked to evaluate and label the performance of the coaching staff. He wants to meet with the coaches and talk to others in the organization after the season.
Head coach Rick Adelman and Taylor will have a discussion that will focus on more than basketball. Adelman’s wife Mary Kay has health issues and Taylor understands “family comes first.” But Taylor wants to know if coaching next season is a priority for Adelman who completes his third season with the Wolves tonight and has a 68th birthday in June.
What Taylor hears from Adelman, long regarded as one of the NBA’s best coaches, will obviously influence whether he wants the coach to return. “You have to take a lot of your energy and thought and emotion into (helping) your family, and it does affect your other areas of responsibility,” Taylor said. “It’s not a criticism of him. …I just want to really sit down and talk to him and see how he feels…before I make a decision or he makes a decision.”
Taylor acknowledged Adelman’s devotion to his wife sometimes took the coach away from the players. “When things like that happen, the basketball team probably doesn’t get its full attention, but that’s life,” Taylor said.
After tonight’s game the Wolves will finish the season with either a 41-41 or 40-42 record. That will certainly be an improvement over last year’s 31-51 record. But not making the playoffs is frustrating for Taylor who also has seen his franchise operate with financial losses many years.
Taylor thought this year might be different for the bottom line. “We’re not going to make our budget. Our budget was to break even, so my sense is that we’ll lose several million dollars.”
The 72-year-old owner, though, hasn’t lost faith in the franchise and recognizes his young team should get better in coming years, led by Love, 25, and 23-year-old point guard Ricky Rubio. Perhaps the Wolves will even become a special team and achieve the NBA title aspirations the franchise has long had.
“Personally, I think I have the patience. I just gotta make sure our coaches and stuff have the patience,” Taylor said.
It will be up to Taylor and president of basketball operations Flip Saunders to find the best supporting players for Love, Pekovic and Rubio. Any personnel moves, though, will be influenced by payroll.
The owner feels pressure not to exceed the NBA salary cap. They have or will make major salary commitments to Love, Pekovic and Rubio. That’s why Taylor, who has most of his roster signed for next season, doesn’t predict the club will sign an expensive free agent this summer. “…You’re looking at probably more the fifth, sixth and seventh positions on the team,” he said.
Worth Noting
Taylor’s other basketball team, the Lynx, made a six-figure profit of less than $500,000 last season. It was the first time the Lynx, who won the WNBA title last year, have been profitable. Taylor expects another winning season and a profitable year in 2014. “By staying into the playoffs and getting to the end, just makes you profitable,” said Taylor who declined to give exact figures.
The Mankato billionaire is closing in on ownership of the Star Tribune. “It probably won’t get completed until maybe the end of May or first of June but I am confident it will get done,” Taylor said.
As newspaper owner will Taylor expect friendly coverage of his Timberwolves? “No. I expect those guys to do their jobs,” he answered.
Former Gopher football players Keanon Cooper and Chris Hawthorne are among 25 interns working in the University of Minnesota Athletic Department. The Golden Gophers Internship program provides 10-12 months of learning experiences in department areas such as communications, facilities, fundraising and marketing. Participants must have a BA or BS degree and preference is given to candidates who have played for Gophers men’s and women’s teams.
Interns receive $1,000.00 per month. More information is available by contacting senior associate athletic director Marc Ryan, ryanx011@umn.edu.
Rachel Banham, who led the Big Ten in scoring last season as a junior averaging 23.3 points per game, is looking forward to next season when eight players return including four juniors and three sophomores. “I think the sky is the limit,” said Banham who will be the team’s only senior. “We have a bunch of really good girls, and really good girls coming in.”
Banham is dating men’s team junior guard Andre Hollins. What did Hollins say after the Gophers won the NIT championship earlier this month? “He was very excited,” Banham answered. “All he kept chanting was N-I-T champs. Clearly, he was very happy.”
The Gophers women’s team hasn’t earned an invitation to the NCAA tournament since Banham has been at Minnesota. Hollins has played in one NCAA tournament, two years ago. What if both teams made deep tourney runs next year? “That would be awesome,” Banham said. “I think that would be the best way for both of us to go out.”
For the third straight season—and for the eighth time in the last nine years—the MIAC attracted more fans to its football games than any other conference in NCAA Division III, according to information released recently by the league. The conference led Division III in both total and average attendance per game for the year 2013. A total of 160,482 fans attended the 48 football games hosted by the MIAC’s nine schools, an average of 3,343 fans per game.
Saint John’s led the nation in attendance per game (7,364) for the 12th time in the last 13 years. In total attendance Bethel (38,054) and the Johnnies (36,822) finished third and fourth respectively.
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