The Timberwolves haven’t found the heart they had last season

MINNEAPOLIS — This loss wasn’t about a uniquely constructed roster acclimating to a new lynchpin. It wasn’t about the increased expectations for a team that came out of nowhere last season. It wasn’t about good looks just not falling or Karl-Anthony Towns missing training camp or Rudy Gobert easing into the season after the physically taxing EuroBasket tournament.

All of those excuses, and more, have been used by the Timberwolves to explain away losses early this season. And all of them have held merit at one time or another through the first 10 games. Not in Game 11 Monday night against the New York Knicks.

The 120-107 loss to the Knicks, a wretched, lifeless performance in front of a hometown crowd that so desperately wants these Wolves to give them a reason to cheer instead of a reason to boo, was about something much more existential. It was about fiber, about character, about heart. The Timberwolves showed none of those things on Monday night, trailing by as many 27 points and allowing a less talented Knicks team do whatever it wanted all game long.

A team that forced this long-suffering basketball market to fall in love with it last season by playing hard, sharing the ball, defending like mad men, talking trash and howling at the moon has had a completely different persona early this season. They hold the ball, do not get out and run, settle for jumpers, refuse to close out to shooters and, most maddeningly, sulk through games with slumped shoulders and furrowed brows. For a team with plenty of talent, the Wolves have made things so much harder on themselves than it has to be.

So far this season, they are a joyless team, fitting considering Tom Thibodeau was on the opposite bench leading the Knicks on Monday night. The boos started to rain down on Thibodeau in the pregame introductions but were directed at the Wolves players when they let the Knicks’ mediocre offense explode for 76 points in the first half.

“I just want to go home happy one of these nights, versus a good team,” Anthony Edwards said. “Like, we played Houston, we beat Houston, everybody was happy. But we’ve got Phoenix next. I want to be able to go home at night and be happy with my dogs. My nephew’s in town. I want to be happy around my nephew, so I want to have a great game the next game.”

The tension is palpable, as it should be. Players seethed and simmered in the locker room after the game, some misdirecting their frustration at media looking for answers that the players do not appear to have.

“We were losing to the New York Knicks by 30,” Edwards said to Naz Reid and Taurean Prince as he headed to the showers, a tone of exasperation in his voice.

The Wolves have trailed by at least 18 points in five of their 11 games. The clunky play they have exhibited offensively with Gobert in the lineup has been expected and understandable given massive adjustments they have had to make to accommodate him on both ends of the floor. But Gobert wasn’t…