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After a win on opening night, very little has been going as planned for the Minnesota Timberwolves as the team around Al Jefferson dropped nine straight. Hoping to get back on track, the Wolves will take on the Houston Rockets at Target Center on Thursday at 1 a.m. GMT.

Given the fact that the Minnesota Timberwolves decided to blow up their team over the summer and started rebuilding, it is no surprise that the young squad has been struggling in the first three weeks of this year’s NBA campaign. More specifically, the Wolves were able to defeat the Nets in their home opener but subsequently lost nine consecutive games. Although Al Jefferson is back in the lineup after a season ending knee injury last year, he has not found his rhythm yet. However, rookie Jonny Flynn looked like a great pickup and put up 14.6 points, 3.3 assists, 3.3 rebounds and 1.5 steals per contest so far.

Even though the Rockets ran into some problems as well, they still managed to perform fairly well. Hanging on to an eight place in the competitive Western Conference, coach Rick Adelman squad is hoping to build on their 5-4 record. Sorely missing Tracy McGrady and Yao Ming, the franchise from Texas seems to be highly motivated to stay in the playoff mix until said All-Stars will be back from their respective injury breaks. Albeit the Rockets clearly have more talent on board than the Wolves, they might have a tough time trying to match-up with Al Jefferson. With Yao Ming out of the picture, Houston is forced to play with an undersized front-court which could be an issue when facing a dominant low-post player like Jefferson. However, Trevor Ariza and company have plenty of options offensively and should be able to outscore the inconsistent Timberwolves under normal circumstances.

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