As if he had never been away

Last 15th of December, Minnesota Timberwolves played against Dallas Mavericks in an exciting game at Target Center, where Ricky Rubio played for the first time after nine months, when he was injured. Without Kevin Love playing, the Wolves beat the Mavs, who didn't make it easy for Minnesota.

These were Minnesota's initial players:
1. Ridnour
2. Shved
3. Pekovic
4. Cunningham
5. Kirilenko

And these were Dallas' initial players:
1. Jones
2. Mayo
3. Kaman
4. Fisher
5. Marion

In the first quarter, Dallas started leading and got 10 points away in the score. Their strategy was using four "little men" and only a tall player, who was the team reference when attacking. This was effective against the Wolves and the quarter finished 32-22 for the Mavericks.

The second quarter was the other way round: Minnesota players woke up and started playing very well, with good passes and good throws. When there weren't many minutes left, Minnesota's coach decided that Ricky Rubio had to play after being injured for nine months. He was very comfortable while he was playing and he was the playmaker of the team again. Minnesota thrushed Dallas and the quarter finished 45-54.

The third quarter was very matched even though the Wolves played as well as in the 2nd quarter, but Mayo and Fisher appeared to save the quarter and the match, and when the game finished, they had scored 20 points each. The score after that quarter was 70-80 led by Minnesota.

In the last quarter, Pekovic scored many pointsand he finished the match with 21 points, but Dallas played very well scoring 10 points more than Minnesota forcing the overtime. That happened by a miracle, because in the last play, the Timberwolves had three chances to scored, which they missed. The score after the four quarter was a draw 102-102.

The overtime was like the second quarter. Minnesota thrushed Dallas again helped by the huge Russian man, Kirilenko. After this, the final score was 106-114 and Minnesota Timberwolves won. But not only this was a great new, the best one was that Ricky Rubio played a fantastic match scoring 8 points, catching 4 rebounces, assisting 9 times, and stealing the ball 3 times in 18 minutes.

David Pender Villalvilla