Karl-Anthony Towns watched last spring as his friend and former Kentucky teammate Devin Booker advanced to the NBA Final with Phoenix. He saw another skilled big man in Denver's Nikola Jokic, who at 26 is one year older than Towns, take home the MVP award and another in Milwaukee's Giannis Antetokounmpo, also 26, win the title.
Towns' generation of the NBA is no longer relegated to sitting on the sidelines while the 30-something stars of the league like LeBron James, James Harden and Kevin Durant got all the hardware.
"It didn't make the vacations any better," Towns said.