{"id":79947,"date":"2025-12-24T08:02:13","date_gmt":"2025-12-24T08:02:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/79947\/"},"modified":"2025-12-24T08:02:13","modified_gmt":"2025-12-24T08:02:13","slug":"knicks-minnesota-visit-stirs-up-karl-anthony-towns-memories","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/79947\/","title":{"rendered":"Knicks’ Minnesota visit stirs up Karl-Anthony Towns’ memories"},"content":{"rendered":"

MINNEAPOLIS \u2014 More than one year later, the feeling remains the same for Karl-Anthony Towns.<\/p>\n

Returning to the Target Center for just the second time since the Knicks\u2019 blockbuster trade to acquire him right before the start of last season, he reflected on his old stomping grounds \u2014 and the community he left behind.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt can be two truths in that,\u201d Towns said before the Knicks\u2019 115-104 loss to the Timberwolves <\/a>on Tuesday night. \u201cYou can be at peace knowing the business cycle keeps going and business is business. After the year we had last year in New York, feeling more at home, fans welcoming you in more, obviously you can be at peace with it, but it still stings when you\u2019re not walking into this locker room. Coming to this amazing state, this city and realize you\u2019re not going to the training facility anymore, you\u2019re not making that drive in, you\u2019re not doing all that. Now you\u2019re in a hotel, it hits different.\u201d<\/p>\n

Towns received a loud ovation when he was introduced before the game. Then after the game, Anthony Edwards \u2014 who Towns said he still talks to almost every day \u2014 said \u201cshout out KAT, I love you KAT\u201d in his on-court postgame interview, to which the crowd cheered again.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s always good to be appreciated,\u201d Towns said after the game. \u201cThere\u2019s nothing more valuable in this league, this job, than to be respected. I left my heart, my soul here in Minnesota. For the fans to just, even after two seasons away, to respect me the way they do and to think of me so highly and to appreciate what I left on the court tonight, it means a lot. It really means a lot.\u201d<\/p>\n

Towns, without Jalen Brunson and OG Anunoby, came out aggressive and recorded 40 points and 13 rebounds. But the loss, here, hurt more than usual.<\/p>\n

\"Karl-AnthonyKarl-Anthony Towns (32) puts up a shot over Miami Heat center Bam Adebayo (13) during the second half when the New York Knicks played the Miami Heat Sunday, December 21, 2025. Robert Sabo for NY Post<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s not a good feeling,\u201d Towns said. \u201cStings a little more for me to be honest. My brothers over there, they\u2019ve been working hard. They\u2019ve got their season on track. They\u2019ve done a really good job recently. They\u2019re a hot team in the NBA. They did enough to win tonight and we just didn\u2019t do enough to win.\u201d<\/p>\n

The trade \u2014 that sent Julius Randle and Donte DiVincenzo to the Timberwolves \u2014 has seemed to work out for both sides. They both reached the conference finals last year, and all three major players involved have had personal success at their new stops. Towns had an adjustment period to coach Mike Brown\u2019s new system, but he\u2019s looked much more comfortable since moving back to primarily playing center.<\/p>\n

And Towns holds no animosity toward the Timberwolves for dealing him away from the only NBA team he had played for. That differs from Randle, who did not look back on his Knicks tenure fondly \u2014 calling the end of it his \u201cdarkest moment\u201d in an interview with The Athletic before the season.<\/p>\n

\"Karl-AnthonyKarl-Anthony Towns #32 of the Minnesota Timberwolves reacts during the fourth quarter against the Dallas Mavericks in Game One of the Western Conference Finals at Target Center on May 22, 2024. Getty Images<\/p>\n

The Timberwolves, on the other hand, are still a special organization to Towns.<\/p>\n

\u201cI know we\u2019ve done a lot of amazing things in the last 12 months in New York, but I had nine years here,\u201d Towns said. \u201cJust watching this organization grow from being a lottery team to now being a Western Conference juggernaut \u2014 to be part of that growth, part of that organization\u2019s rise, to be blessed with the opportunity to change a lot of people\u2019s lives. And a lot of the kids that grew up watching me now are adults. Some of them got kids themselves. To be able to give them something to cheer for, it\u2019s what it\u2019s really all about.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"MINNEAPOLIS \u2014 More than one year later, the feeling remains the same for Karl-Anthony Towns. Returning to the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":79948,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[1555,9130,21,9,11,1104,10,319],"class_list":{"0":"post-79947","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-new-york","8":"tag-karl-anthony-towns","9":"tag-minnesota-timberwolves","10":"tag-nba","11":"tag-new-york","12":"tag-new-york-headlines","13":"tag-new-york-knicks","14":"tag-new-york-news","15":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/79947","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=79947"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/79947\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/79948"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=79947"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=79947"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=79947"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}