LOS ANGELES — For the second time in as many seasons, Minnesota has won a playoff series. And it did so again by taking down one of the game’s titans.
A year after unceremoniously bouncing Kevin Durant and his Phoenix team in four games, the Wolves dispatched LeBron James and the Lakers in five, winning Game 5 103-96 in Los Angeles on Wednesday to secure a 4-1 series victory.
And they have Rudy Gobert to thank for it.
“It feels good,” Gobert said. “… But it’s about winning. Two points, six points, it’s about winning.”
After playing a marginal role in the series through four games — and not being on the floor to close either Game 3 or Game 4 — Gobert exploded for 27 points and 24 rebounds, both career highs.
It was all necessary on a night where Minnesota couldn’t buy an outside shot. The Wolves were biblically bad from 3-point range.
The Wolves went 7 for 47 from distance Wednesday. Anthony Edwards went just 5 for 19 from the field.
Luka Doncic suffered a back injury on a drive to the bucket with 1 minute to play in the second quarter. He left the game immediately after shooting the free throws, only to return with apparent limited mobility to open the third.
“Over the course of the season, I felt it was getting harder and harder for them to keep me off the boards,” Gobert said.
But Doncic went on to explode in that frame, scoring 14 points to breathe life back into the Lakers. Los Angeles even took the lead at one point in the quarter.
Yet Minnesota was able to endure it all. Because Gobert even countered the Doncic tidal wave in the third with a nine-point, eight-rebound quarter. In the final frame, Gobert and Julius Randle took turns simply bullying the Lakers on the interior.
Randle finished with 23 points.
In the end, the Wolves were simply too big, too fast and too strong for the Lakers, and they sent them home in five games because of it.
Minnesota will play either Houston or Golden State in the Western Conference semifinals. The start date of that series is to be determined.
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