Karl-Anthony Towns undergoing surgery in Timberwolves concern

Karl-Anthony Towns will go under the knife. 

The Timberwolves star will undergo surgery to repair a torn meniscus in his left knee, ESPN’s Adrian Wojnarowski reported Thursday night. 

Towns will be re-evaluated in a month, and the expectation is that he will be back sometime early in the NBA playoffs. 

Towns was not with the team when it began a six-game road trip in Indianapolis on Thursday night, The Athletic reported.

There is a little more than a month remaining in the Timberwolves’ season, and they’re the top team in the Western Conference.

Towns has played a large part in making that happen. 

He’s averaged 22.1 points and 8.4 rebounds while shooting 42 percent from 3-point range in 60 games this season. 

Towns made his fourth NBA All-Star appearance this season, and he proved what an asset that he can be when he’s healthy. 

This comes one year after Towns missed 51 games with a calf injury. 

The injury comes at a tough time, as the T-Wolves are jockeying for position with the Thunder, Nuggets and Clippers, with all four teams separated by only three games. 

The Timberwolves came away with a close 113-111 win over the Pacers on Thursday night, and they now have just 19 games left on the calendar before the playoffs begin. 

How much of an impact Towns’ absence has on the rest of this season will start to become more clear, but with a strong season, Minnesota has positioned itself in a place where it would take a massive collapse to fall far enough that it would be in the play-in round.