"Kevin McHale walked -- actually limped is the more accurate description -- back into Target Center on Monday morning, dressed in jeans, sneakers and a winter coat, fresh off a two-hour snowy commute from his home in North Oaks.

McHale entered through the visitors tunnel, instead of the opposite end of the court, a path he took hundreds of times as Timberwolves executive and coach. Feel weird coming in that other door?

"I've walked in that end a lot of times," he said. "No different."

OK, what about the emotion of being back inside Target Center, his workplace for so many years, a building he's seen filled with emotion and life but also as dreary as a graveyard?

"Ah, it's been three years," McHale said, clearly not interested in a stroll down memory lane. "There's only one guy left on that team, Kevin Love, from when I was here. I've been in the arena a million different times. Been here for a lot of good times and bad times.""