Games 27: Wolves 116, Kings 92 and 28: Celtics 122, Wolves 104

Well Wolves fans, more of the same I guess. Win a nice game against Sacramento after getting beat by them the week earlier, lose a bad one to a good Celtics team.

The phrase of the year just might be: Rinse and Repeat.

Friday Night Rambis Quote: “The guys did a good job of executing the game plan. For the most part, I could see them doing the right things.”

Friday Night Four Factors:

	Pace	Eff	eFG	FT/FG	OREB%	TOr
SAC	106.0	90.6	45.1%	15.4	20.8	17.0
MIN		105.7	55.8%	18.6	25.0	20.8

Sunday Night Rambis Quote via Al Jefferson: “In the words of Coach, we just weren’t playing hard. That was the difference.”

Sunday Night Four Factors:

	Pace	Eff	eFG	FT/FG	OREB%	TOr
MIN	99.0	105.1	44.4%	26.7	31.4	13.1
BOS		123.2	57.4%	35.8	28.6	16.2

Take a look at the Wolves efficiency in both games. Yep 105 in both, a good 10 above their brutal season average of 95. (Second worst only to NJ) So even though the Wolves shot a brutal 44% against the Celtics they made up for it with a slightly higher than average FT/FG rate, a solid 31% OREB rate, and a slightly lower than normal TO rate. This is how the four factors work. Shooting is worth about 40% and is the most important (and obviously the reason the Wolves are 2nd to last in the legaue in effeciency) with turnovers (25%), rebounding (20%), and free throws (15%) supporting it.

So as one can see by scanning the second line from Sunday night’s game, the Wolves defense didn’t really show up allowing the Celtics to shoot 57% and get to the line a bunch.

We’ll keep an eye on the Wolves efficiency though, if they can keep that up in the 105 range they are going to start winning some more games.

To finish a few (somewhat) funny lines about the Wolves from my counterparts in the Truehoop Network  first from Zach Harper at the Kings blog, Cowbell Kingdom:

“Every time a Corey Brewer jump shot is taken, an angel loses its wings.

And second from Brian Robb over at Celtics Hub in his pre-game preview, on what the Wolves do poorly:

Where do I begin? Oh right….shooting from anywhere on the court.

Well fans the secret is out I guess.

Paging David Kahn, paging David Kahn, a shooter is needed at the Target Center on court immediately.