Wolves 90, Bucks 83: A little more like it

To truly understand the importance of Monday's 90-83 victory at Milwaukee, you have to look back at Sunday night's come-from-behind victory against the Bulls.

Because as much grit as the Wolves showed in the overtime victory over Chicago, it had to much of an early-season feel to it. You know, kind of a Wittman feel to it. Why? Because there was too much Big Al for my taste. 

The 39 points were great and there are going to be nights when a player gets hot. But it seemed that there were times when the Wolves offense could be summed up like this: Throw the ball to the big fella, stand around and watch him.

So that brings us back to Tuesday night and the second half of a back-to-back at the Bradley Center. Which Wolves offense would show up? The share-the-ball-and-zip-it-around Wolves of the past six weeks? Or the stand-around-and-watch-Big-Al-while-Wittman-stomps-his-feet Wolves?

Maybe it is simply paranoia that the recent play under McHale is simply a dream and eventually someone is going to say, 'Ah, this was all just a big joke, your team is still horrible.' 

Well if that is going to happen (and it still seems possible), it didn't happen on Monday night. Instead of going back in time to early December, the standing around appeared to be a one-night event.

This was far from a perfect outing for the Wolves. There were turnovers, there were missed shots and there was a crap fourth quarter, but there was a third quarter that gave a look at how the Wolves have progressed.

The scoring for the Wolves in the third went like this:

Bassy 3, Al layup, Gomes layup, Al jumper, Al dunk, Bassy jumper, Smith layoup, Smith dunk, Foye FTs, Love FT, Smith hook, Gomes FT, Love FTs, Gomes.

If you're counting, that is six different players scoring. It was a quarter that let the Wolves stretch their lead from four points to 14.

Other items of note:

- How about Mike Miller actually making a three-pointer that meant something, buring one in the fourth quarter that stretched the Wolves lead from six to nine.

- Gomes' 22 points were a season high.

- The Wolves are now 12-12 under McHale, a fairly amazing feat considering they lost eight in a row after Wittman was fired.

- Minnesota has won 10 games in a month for the first time since March '05.

- I liked J.B. Bickerstaff's look of the argyle sweater and no tie under his jacket. Very solid.

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