Minnesota Timberwolves star Karl-Anthony Towns tore the meniscus in his left knee and is out indefinitely, league sources said Thursday.
Towns, who was an All-Star last month, has been gathering further opinions on the injury over the past 24 hours, the sources said. He is not with the team to start its six-game road trip as he continues looking into treatment options to determine the best course of action for his injury.
Towns has delivered a bounce-back season after missing 51 games last season with a calf injury. He made his fourth All-Star team and was delivering a resounding statement to the rest of the league that his play could help deliver significant team success.
The 7-footer was averaging 22.1 points, 8.4 rebounds and 3.0 assists per game and shooting 50.6 percent from the field, including 42.3 percent from beyond the 3-point line.
The Timberwolves are currently first in the Northwest Division and are tied with the Oklahoma City Thunder at 43-19 atop the Western Conference, where they’ve been for most of the season. Towns’ ability to defend at the power forward position while maintaining his offensive efficiency has been a big reason Minnesota has excelled. His teamwork with Rudy Gobert has made an unconventional lineup a major strength for a team with designs on advancing out of the first round of the playoffs for just the second time in franchise history.
For a player who has been through so much hardship in his career — most notably with the death of his mother from COVID-19 but also all the losing in Minnesota earlier in his career and several significant injuries that have taken their toll in three of the previous four seasons — having to miss more time with this knee injury is a cruel blow. Of all the players who deserved to revel in the new-found success the Timberwolves have had this season, Towns is certainly at or near the top of the list.
Towns’ knee injury could’ve been playing a role in his sluggish play of late. His scoring average dipped to 16 points per game in Minnesota’s last four contests.
Who can replace Towns?
Losing Towns for any length of time is a huge blow to the Timberwolves’ offense, which has languished for much of the season. They have the 18th-ranked offense at 114.6 points per 100 possessions, a far cry from their top-rated defense. Their most used five-man lineup — the starting group that includes Towns, Gobert, Anthony Edwards, Jaden McDaniels and Mike Conley — has an offensive rating of 118.9, which would be tied for fourth in the NBA over a full season, per NBA.com.
According to Cleaning the Glass, which eliminates garbage-time minutes, the Wolves are 7.7 points per 100 possessions better on offense with Towns on the floor.
The Wolves do have some options in his absence. Naz Reid has made huge strides this season in his shift from backup center to backup power forward, improving his defense on the perimeter so he can play alongside Towns or Gobert. The two-man lineups with Reid and Gobert together have a plus-14 net rating, per NBA.com.
Kyle Anderson would seem like the favorite to replace Towns in the starting lineup, which would help the best defense in the league to only get better. But they will need Reid, and possibly T.J. Warren, who was signed this week, and/or Luka Garza, to step up and give them more scoring.
If Towns does miss extended time, it comes at a very difficult time in the schedule. The Wolves start a six-game trip in Indiana on Thursday night. They play at Cleveland on Friday, go to Los Angeles for games against the Lakers on Sunday and Clippers on Tuesday and then finish the trip with two games in Utah. Twelve of their final 20 games of the season are against teams with winning records. — Jon Krawczynski, Timberwolves beat writer
Who needs to step up in Towns’ absence?
This could put more pressure on Edwards to lead the group. The 22-year-old hasn’t been on his game lately, including on Monday night against Portland when he wasn’t on…
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