With a few minutes to go in the third quarter of Friday night’s game between the Minnesota Timberwolves and the Houston Rockets, the entire T-Wolves organization held their collective breath as one of their two All-Stars crumpled to the floor with an apparent non-contact knee injury.Jimmy Butler, who is averaging 22.4 points, 5.5 rebounds and 5.0 assists this season, was the victim and he couldn’t put any weight on the injured leg as he was helped to the locker room.Luckily, no damage that showed up on the initial x-ray, but the MRI that was scheduled for Saturday told more of the story.As with every NBA player, a torn ACL was the obvious concern for Butler. If that was the case, it would essentially eliminate his team from any real championship contention.But, the results are in, and it appears as though Butler and his team got very lucky.The diagnosis is a torn meniscus. Although he will undergo surgery in the near future, he could return in 4-to-6 weeks, as reported by Shams Charania of Yahoo Sports.

Although the Timberwolves will certainly have to adjust to fill the massive void that Butler’s absence has created, they should be very thankful that Butler didn’t suffer a catastrophic injury. Not only would that have ruined their chances this season, but it would have likely lingered well into next season as well, which could have set the upward-trending direction of the team backwards.

At 37-26 and in fourth place in the Western Conference heading into Sunday, the Wolves will rely heavily on All-Star Karl-Anthony Towns, Andrew Wiggins and Jeff Teague to shoulder much of the load on the offensive end of the floor. Although coach Tom Thibodeau loves to keep his rotations tight and relies on giving his starters heavy minutes, he might have to get a bit creative to mix and match against his opposition.

Unfortunately, Minnesota’s schedule doesn’t give them much of a break and will be a major test immediately. After squaring off against the Sacramento Kings in their next game, they square off against eight-straight plus-.500 teams to begin the month of March, including the Boston Celtics, Golden State Warriors, San Antonio Spurs, and Houston Rockets. After that span of games, the early-end of Butler’s possible timetable will arrive. But, his return will likely depend slightly on the team’s position in the standings and almost entirely on how he is recovering.