Wednesday NBA Roundup: Anthony Davis Wins Battle, but War with KAT Will Come

Anthony Davis and Karl-Anthony Towns can both still have shares of the NBA’s future, but the present clearly belongs to just one.

Davis and the New Orleans Pelicans buried Towns’ Minnesota Timberwolves, winning 117-96 in a game that highlighted the yawning chasm between tremendous potential and fully realized stardom.

Share Tweet

Taking a 21-2 first-quarter scoring edge over Towns and never looking back, Davis finished with 45 points, 10 rebounds and three assists on 17-of-27 shooting. It was the fourth time AD pumped in at least that many points in a game, and he’s now the proud owner of three of the season’s six highest scoring outputs.

He had it all working, according to Justin Verrier of ESPN.com:

Anthony Davis’ last three buckets: Turnaround jumper off a postup; faced up and beat Towns off a quick dribble; dunk off the rim over a dude

— Justin Verrier (@JustinVerrier) November 24, 2016

And it was almost as though Davis was trying to send a message—or perhaps respond to one delivered by the league’s general managers before the season began:

You did this NBA GMs. This is your fault.https://t.co/ry9ojonNGq pic.twitter.com/IGq1AkTtnu

— David Fisher (@DavidFisherTBW) November 24, 2016

Towns managed nine points and 11 rebounds, and his night wasn’t without its highlights:

Towns with the ball fake scoop layup pic.twitter.com/cEHOBFvlfv

— A Wolf Among Wolves (@AWAWBlog) November 24, 2016

Plays like that made it a little strange to hear Towns, interviewed on the ESPN broadcast, saying he wished he had “the ability to play a little faster as (Davis) does…He’s a little more athletic than I am, and I wish I was as athletic as he was.”

And though Towns was soundly outplayed by Davis, there remain encouraging signs the Timberwolves young star will one day equal or surpass the Pelicans’ stud. For example, a quick scan of Basketball-Reference’s shot tendencies for both players shows Davis relying increasingly on those tricky in-between looks, getting a larger and larger portion of his field-goal attempts from outside the restricted area and inside the arc.

Towns, meanwhile, is condensing his attempts to everyone’s favorite high-percentage zones: point-blank and three-point range.

Those are trends that’ll warrant monitoring in the future. More immediately, Towns’ Timberwolves must deal with their predictable collapses.

New Orleans roared to a 36-18 third-quarter advantage that swung this game, and the post-halftime implosion was all too familiar to the Wolves, as this graphic from NBA on ESPN illustrates:

Third quarters have not been kind to the Timberwolves this season. pic.twitter.com/nwMENdsTwa

— NBA on ESPN (@ESPNNBA) November 24, 2016

Minnesota has been outscored in 12 of the 14 third quarters it’s played this season.

Flaws and all, you’d still take Towns’ surrounding cast over Davis’ because nobody on New Orleans’ support staff has the promise of Andrew Wiggins or Zach LaVine, and nobody is out there doing things like this:

Share Tweet

But oddly, you can tie some of Minnesota’s failures to its glut of talented kids. Part of the Wolves’ problems in dealing with adversity (and third-quarter slumps) is that in addition to lapses in focus and commitment, these young players who rightfully believe they’ll be stars someday try to fix everything on their own, as NBA analyst Britt Robson pointed out with respect to Wiggins:

Andrew Wiggins burning a ton of goodwill in 3 games. Pass the ball!

— brittrobson (@brittrobson) November 24, 2016

What’s more, the coexistence of a handful of potential alphas—even if Towns is clearly the real top dog—complicates things for Towns in a way Davis has never seen. AD has it tougher, sure, but he’s been forged by his circumstances, forced to develop into his team’s be-all, end-all precisely because the Pelicans have never had anyone else to challenge him for the role.

Or get in his way.

So while Towns has to develop in concert with others, Davis, by necessity, turned into the godly force he is today:

live look at anthony davis pic.twitter.com/TQh1y1e3ie

— ☕netw3rk (@netw3rk) November 24, 2016

The idea of adversity spurring development isn’t a new one.

Ultimately, anyone in their right mind should still buy as much stock in Davis and Towns as possible. Both are going nowhere but up.

If Wednesday taught us anything, though, Davis’ stock is already booming, while Towns’ remains more of a speculative play.

The Sixers Have Some Learning to Do

The Memphis Grizzlies outlasted the feisty Philadelphia 76ers in double overtime, prevailing 104-99 behind 25 points, nine rebounds and nine assists from Mike Conley. Memphis earned its sixth consecutive win, though it’s worth wondering what would have happened if Joel Embiid’s minutes limit hadn’t sidelined him for the second overtime period.

Maybe in addition to the 12 points, 11 rebounds and three blocks we’d seen to that point, we would have also witnessed another eye-opening sequence like this:

Share Tweet

Per Derek Bodner of Philadelphia Magazine, Embiid is as eager as everyone else to …

continue reading in source www.bleacherreport.com