Report: Karl-Anthony Towns has torn meniscus, out indefinitely
Minnesota Timberwolves star big man Karl-Anthony Towns has been diagnosed with a torn meniscus in his left knee and will be out indefinitely, NBA insider Shams Charania of The Athletic first reported Thursday morning.
Towns only played 21 minutes in Minnesota’s 119-114 win over the Portland Trail Blazers, his second-lowest minute total of the season. He had 14 points, four rebounds, one assist and two blocks on 5-of-12 shooting.
This is a big blow for Minnesota, who is tied with the Oklahoma City Thunder at the top of the Western Conference at 49-13. Towns is now the second big-name big go down this season with a torn meniscus, the other being Philadelphia 76ers star center and reigning MVP Joel Embiid.
The team has yet to confirm the reports.
Should this be the last we see of Towns this season, he finished averaging 22.1 points, 8.4 rebounds and three assists on 50.6 percent shooting, 42.3 percent 3-point shooting and 87.4 percent from the charity stripe. He appeared in 60 of the team’s 62 games after an injury-riddled 2022-23 campaign, appearing in just 29 games due to a calf injury.
The Timberwolves own the NBA’s third-best NET Rating–courting the league’s best defense paired with the No. 18 offense. They may have the league’s best backup big in Naz Reid to mitigate Towns’ loss, but its trek at dethroning Denver and potentially making it out of the West becomes that much harder with Towns sidelined.
In half-court situations, Minnesota sports the 14th-best offense, scoring exactly 100 points per 100 plays, per Cleaning The Glass. Towns added 7.1 points per 100 plays in such situations versus when he was not on the floor, the second-highest mark on the team (min. 500 minutes) and a mark that grades in the 93rd percentile leaguewide.
That gap will have to soften if they want to make a deep postseason run. Minnesota already plays at the slowest pace of the league, but they have recorded just 95.1 half-court points per 100 plays with Towns off the floor (31st percentile). Playoff basketball is played more in the half-court; even with the best defense and second-best 3-point percentage, poor half-court offensive production is a poor, unrealistic formula for sustained playoff success.
How do you think Towns’ injury impacts the Timberwolves’ playoff chances? Let us know in the comments!
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