One of the defining characteristics of the Denver Nuggets is their ability to take advantage of another team's mistakes.
Those mistakes can be subtle, like somebody being a step slow in a rotation to cover an open shooter. Or they can be more obvious, like the calamitous way in which the Timberwolves closed the first half of their 115-107 loss in Game 4 to the defending champions Sunday night at Target Center.
"Yeah, that hurt," Wolves center Karl-Anthony Towns said. "That hurt."
There was more to the Wolves' loss than the final 20.2 seconds of the second quarter, like Nikola Jokic seeming to have figured out the Wolves defense, but the Wolves lost by eight and they gave up eight points in this sequence, which began with an open three from Kentavious Caldwell-Pope off an assist from Jokic.
Then Anthony Edwards, who tried to will his slumping teammates to victory with 44 points, committed a turnover on the other end. Jokic found a streaking Michael Porter Jr. for a dunk with 1.6 seconds to go, and that should have been the end of the half, except Jamal Murray intercepted an errant pass from Nickeil Alexander-Walker just beyond midcourt and heaved in the shot as time expired.
A seven-point game became 15, and a series that looked on the verge of being over when the Wolves arrived in Minnesota ahead 2-0 is now in perilous position with the Nuggets rolling into Game 5 on Tuesday night in Denver.
"This is a great team. They're not going to beat themselves," Wolves coach Chris Finch said. "We talked about that at the beginning of the series. It's inexcusable to have a segment like that where they have eight points in seven seconds or something like that. … These are inexcusable plays you can't make right now."
There were more like that, like the Wolves leaving Christian Braun open on an inbound pass in the fourth quarter as they were making one last charge, and Braun ended up at the free-throw line. There was confusion on defensive assignments that led to open looks for a Denver offense that shot 57% from the field.
On offense, the Wolves were frantic for the first half, especially Towns, who was just 1-for-10 on his way to scoring 13 points.
"I just wanted to continue to take shots that I was given," Towns said. "Continue to be aggressive and put pressure on the defense. Things weren't falling today. I take responsibility for that."
Even after the offense got back on track a bit in the second half, the Wolves couldn't get the stops needed to get closer than six. Then right on cue, whenever the Wolves made a mistake, Denver pounced. The Wolves committed 11 turnovers, not a bad number, but Denver capitalized for 20 points. The Wolves had 11 points off 12 Nuggets turnovers.
"I think the thing that stood out about the turnovers was the timeliness of them," Finch said.
BOXSCORE: Denver 115, Wolves 107
Jokic finished with 35 points, seven rebounds and seven assists and seemed to mold the Wolves defense to his liking like a lump of clay. Aaron Gordon joined him in that with a 27-point performance that was demoralizing to the Wolves' defensive strategy. The Wolves would prefer to not pay much attention to Gordon, who has struggled to shoot this season, and devote more to Jokic. Gordon went 11-for-12, which opened the offense even more for Jokic and Murray (19 points, eight assists).
"If Gordon turns into Kobe Bryant for stretches, we got to be living with that," center Rudy Gobert said. "Those shots were contested, highly contested some of them. This is part of the game."
Jokic got help from his supporting cast, while the Wolves made Edwards a one-man show.
Denver's bench, a supposed weakness entering the series, out-produced the Wolves bench with Justin Holiday cashing in 10 points and Braun 11. The Nuggets had the edge in bench points 27-13. The Wolves were 6-for-20 from three-point range outside of Edwards and were unable to capitalize on the increased attention he received. Denver shot 57% to the Wolves' 48%. The Wolves also went just 18-for-27 from the free-throw line.
"I said it after Game 2: They're not going to lay down," Edwards said. "They're going to punch, and we're going to punch back. They beat us up tonight. The last two nights, they beat us up in the fight. That's OK. We're going to be all right. Going to bounce back, figure it out next game, and we'll be ready again."
Edwards' positivity came out from his teammates in the postgame reaction. There was little doom and gloom, just recognition that the Wolves need to clean up their defensive assignments and better space the floor on offense for Edwards.
"We're all extremely confident," Wolves center Naz Reid said. "Nobody has long faces, nobody is upset, worried or anything like that. Everybody knows that you can go out there, compete at the highest level with anybody."
Reid then pointed out the statistic that the Wolves will clutch tightly headed into Game 5 — they haven't lost three games in a row all season. Does that mean anything in the playoffs?
"I hope so," point guard Mike Conley said.
Their season might depend on it.
