The Minnesota Timberwolves’ Kevin Love broke Moses Malone’s 31-year record by surpassing his mark of 51 straight double-doubles Wednesday night against the Indiana Pacers.
Love notched his 52 consecutive double-double in the second quarter Wednesday night.
While the Wolves as a team have struggled mightily throughout the year, Love’s streak has made the Wolves semi-relevant through a season that has had more downs than ups.
Love notched his record setting double-double with his 16-point, 21 rebound performance in the Wolves 101-75 thrashing of the Indian Pacers.
While following the streak has been entertaining, it still doesn’t negate the fact that as a team it took the Wolves until March 9th to have more wins (16) than Love’s rebounds per game (15.8).
But nonetheless credit needs to be given when credit is due, and Love has been fantastic for the Wolves this season.
It was gut check time for Love after he came back to reality on November 19th in the wake of his dominating 31-point 31-rebound performance just five days earlier against the New York Knicks.
On that November 19th night, Love was held scoreless and limited to only seven rebounds in front of his home crowd against the defending champion Los Angeles Lakers.
Since then Love has never looked back.
Three days later Love put up a 24 point 17 rebound performance against the Oklahoma City Thunder. Game one of his now 52 game double-double streak.
Love, hampered by a swollen knee, struggled early Wednesday night, but a ten point seven rebound second quarter propelled him to a double-double class all of his own. 52 straight.
While this season has been a struggle for Love and the Wolves, his effort has never been put to question. Night in and night out Love gives everything he can, and as a fan I can’t be any more proud of Love for reaching this milestone.
While some believe Love’s intrinsic motivation has been because of the streak, so be it. The streak represents what Love has shown all year, an ability and desire to leave everything he has on the floor every single night.
While the Wolves had one of their more dominating performances of the season on Wednesday night, the night belongs to Love.
And Kevin, enjoy it, because you deserve it.
-Brett Cloutier
Brett is a contributor to The Sports Bank as the beat writer for the Minnesota Timberwolves and for Minnesota Gopher hockey. He is the co-host of “The Backdoor Cut,” a Minneapolis based sports and pop culture themed radio show. The show can also be found in podcast form.
You can follow Brett on Twitter @brettcloutier