Towns to miss games with dislocated left wriston December 28, 2020 at 6:45 pm

8:33 PM ET

Minnesota Timberwolves star Karl-Anthony Towns suffered a dislocated left wrist and is expected to miss several games before he’s cleared to return.

No surgery will be required, the team said Sunday, and the organization is terming his timeline on the basis of a weekly evaluation. There’s optimism it will be a relatively short-term absence for Towns, sources told ESPN.

Towns had season-ending surgery on his left wrist a year ago, but this injury is in a different spot, sources said. He was evaluated by a hand specialist in Los Angeles, where the Timberwolves play the Lakers on Sunday and the Clippers on Tuesday.

Towns was knocked out of the air and onto the ground, landing on his left hand, late in the Timberwolves’ victory over Utah on Saturday night. He left the court for the locker room, only to return later and reenter the game as a self-described “decoy” in the final moments.

Towns has been instrumental in leading Minnesota to a 2-0 start, averaging 22.6 points, 11.5 rebounds and five assists. Second-year center Naz Reid will start Sunday in place of Towns.

“[Towns] has been really good for us,” coach Ryan Saunders said before the game. “So we need other guys to fill those roles and replacing Karl-Anthony Towns with one individual, you do that with a team effort and same thing we always say when it comes to guarding great players, do everything as a team and that’s what this group has been doing.”

ESPN’s Dave McMenamin contributed to this report.