Minnesota got vengeance for one of its worst losses of the season on Sunday.

Three weeks after kicking away a late lead in Sacramento, the Timberwolves closed the door on the Kings at Target Center for a 117-103 victory.

Minnesota has now won seven of its last eight games. The last two have come short-handed. Anthony Edwards (foot soreness) and Mike Conley (Achilles tendinopathy) each missed both Sunday’s tilt and Friday’s win over the Warriors).

The Wolves (18-9) played most of the second half against Sacramento without Rudy Gobert. The center logged seven points and 12 rebounds in 20 minutes before exiting early in the third quarter due to what the team said were personal reasons.

Minnesota was unimpressive early and trailed the Kings (6-20) at the break. And the lead was just one early in the final frame before the Wolves finally hit their closing gear with a 26-10 run that quickly moved the game out of reach.

Timberwolves coach Chris Finch lauded the improvement his team has shown down the stretch of games of late. The Sacramento collapse from three weeks prior was one of a few of that sort in a short span.

The Kings threatened a rally again late Sunday, as a pair of triples trimmed a 12-point Wolves lead to six with 2 minutes, 22 seconds to play. But Minnesota responded in short order. Naz Reid hit a triple on the other end, then Donte DiVincenzo got a steal he turned into a layup on the other end to quickly boost the lead back to 11 and effectively play the game on ice.

“Just playing with intensity, playing with a little bit more effort and desire,” Naz Reid said in his on-court, postgame television interview.

Bones Hyland, who got his second straight start, scored nine of his 18 points in the final frame. Reid scored eight in the quarter, while Julius Randle had seven and Donte DiVincenzo had five.

That’s the balance Minnesota has flashed over each of its last two wins. The Wolves have five guys drop 17-plus points on Friday. Five players scored 18 or more on Sunday. That included double-doubles for Randle (24 points and 10 rebounds) and Reid (20 points and 11 rebounds), while Jaden McDaniels had 21 points and DiVincenzo and Hyland scored 18 apiece.

Hyland played only four minutes in Friday’s win over Golden State before a knee bruise ended his starting opportunity in the first quarter. He recovered in time to start again Sunday and logged 36 minutes in the win.

“Last game, it was such a bummer. … That one, I couldn’t walk. It was hurting bad,” Hyland said in his postgame television interview. “I wanted to be out there.”

Yes, the balance is part of Minnesota’s way of compensating for the absence of Edwards’ scoring, but Reid seemed to indicate it’s the type of egalitarian offense the Wolves can produce even when their best player returns.

“Even when he is in the game, we’ve got a bunch of guys who can go,” Reid said. “I think it just speaks to the talent that we have. … We have talent all across the board.”

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It’s only a coincidence that on the night the Minnesota Wild paid tribute to the movie “Star Wars,” on the ice there was “A New Hope” on display for all to see.

By the time their 6-2 blowout of previously high-flying Boston was complete on Sunday, the high price that Wild general manager Bill Guerin paid to bring defenseman Quinn Hughes to Minnesota was looking like a savvy investment.

Hughes — widely regarded as one of the top defensemen in the NHL — scored a third-period goal, ran the team’s top power-play unit and had fans buzzing all night in his first game in a Wild uniform.

“The crowd was electric from, I would say, warmups to the introductions and throughout the game,” Wild coach John Hynes said. “It was great to see the building like that, and the guys performed the way they did, so it was a great combo.”

Brock Faber is used to trading hockey-related texts with his Wild teammates. But when he was cooking on Friday evening and his phone started to light up with messages from his high school friends, he knew something big was up.

“I don’t have Twitter, really, and I don’t follow any hockey accounts on my only other social media, Instagram, so all my buddies were texting me,” Faber recalled. “They were like ‘Quinn Hughes is coming!’ I obviously was shocked. It was something you never saw coming. Obviously, my buddies were joking that they’re mad because I’m not going to be on the first power play anymore.”

Indeed, when the Wild got their initial man advantage of the night versus Boston, it was Hughes taking the first shift on the blue line. Although, it was the second power-play unit that gave the home team the lead, with Faber setting up Jared Spurgeon for the game’s first goal.

Faber started Sunday’s game alongside Hughes, who early on appeared perhaps a bit jittery, with an uncharacteristic giveaway in the neutral zone and a puck that hopped Hughes’ stick at the offensive blue line.

If there were first-period adjustments to be made, it would be understandable following a span of roughly 50 hours that saw Hughes fly from Vancouver to Newark, learn of the trade that would send him to Minnesota, spend a night with his two brothers that play for the Devils, then head to the “State of Hockey” via Wild owner Craig Leipold’s private jet, with general manager Bill Guerin accompanying him.

“My body was a little fatigued. I didn’t really have my legs today,” Hughes admitted, adding that he came to Minnesota on a below-zero night owning almost nothing in the way of warm winter clothing.

“I definitely have some shopping to do,” he said, after logging nearly 27 minutes on the ice with three shots on goal.

Faber was traded to Minnesota in the offseason without ever playing a game for Los Angeles, the team that drafted him. He was immediately empathic to what his new defensive partner was facing, and equally impressed with what Hughes brought in Game 1.

“For his personal life, he’s just had to up and leave, and 48 hours later, he’s playing for a new team,” Faber said. “That’s hard and he made it look pretty dang easy.”

In his postgame press conference, Hughes had the look of someone who had seen and done a lot in 48 hours, including instilling belief that this could be a special season in the minds of Wild fans. He admitted still getting to know his new team and their system, and promised that there is definitely hope on the horizon in Minnesota.

“A little nerves there in the first, and you could see them on my first power play,” Hughes admitted. “It might take a couple games, but I think as we get to Christmas and after Christmas, we’ll be rolling.”

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By CHRISTOPHER WEBER and MIKE BALSAMO

LOS ANGELES (AP) — Homicide detectives were investigating Sunday after two people were found dead at director-actor Rob Reiner’s Los Angeles home, authorities said.

The Los Angeles Fire Department said it responded to a medical aid request shortly after 3:30 p.m. and found a 78-year-old man and 68-year-old woman dead inside.

Detectives with the Robbery Homicide Division were investigating an “apparent homicide” at Reiner’s home, said Capt. Mike Bland with the Los Angeles Police Department. Authorities have not confirmed the identities of the people found dead at the residence in the upscale Brentwood neighborhood on the city’s west side that’s home to many celebrities.

Reiner is long one of the most prolific directors in Hollywood, and his work includes some of the most memorable movies of the 1980s and ’90s, including “This is Spinal Tap,” “A Few Good Men,” “When Harry Met Sally” and “The Princess Bride.”

His role as Meathead in the 1970s TV classic “All in the Family” alongside Carol O’Connor’s Archie Bunker catapulted him to fame.

Reiner turned 78 in March.

Messages to his representatives were not immediately returned Sunday night.

The son of comedy legend Carl Reiner, Rob Reiner has been married to photographer Michele Singer Reiner since 1989. The two met while he was directing “When Harry Met Sally” and have three children together.

Reiner was previously married to actor-director Penny Marshall from 1971 to 1981. He adopted her daughter, Tracy Reiner. Carl Reiner died in 2020 at age 98 and Marshall died in 2018.

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Balsamo reported from Washington. Associated Press writer Andrew Dalton in Los Angeles contributed.

If there were any doubt that things are different now for the Minnesota Wild, the minute-long ovation following Quinn Hughes’ first goal in green and red erased those notions.

Hughes, acquired Friday in the biggest in-season trade in franchise history, scored the fourth goal in Minnesota’s 6-2 rout of the Boston Bruins on Sunday evening at Grand Casino Arena, stretching the Wild’s winning streak to four games.

Kirill Kaprizov scored twice, while Jared Spurgeon, Ryan Hartman and Matt Boldy added goals for the Wild. They got a 29-save performance from goalie Filip Gustavsson, who improved to 10-8-3 this season.

But fans came to see the new guy on the blue line wearing No. 43, and Hughes did not disappoint. With the Wild already up by three, his wrist shot from the top of the left circle in the opening minute of the third period fooled Bruins goalie Jeremy Swayman between the knees.

It was Hughes’ third goal of the season, and the first of his career without a Vancouver Canucks jersey on. The goal sent the already raucous crowd into a frenzy that lasted a full minute, nearly drowning out the goal announcement over the public address system.

Outshot early, the Wild got the game’s first power play, and the first lead when Spurgeon’s shot from the blue line made its way through a crowd in front of Swayman. It was the second goal of the season for the Minnesota captain and their second man-advantage goal in as many games.

Minnesota’s penalty killers, who had been uncharacteristically porous one day earlier versus Ottawa, negated Boston’s first power play, as Gustavsson had seven saves in the first period.

The Bruins got another power play early in the middle frame, and again Gustavsson was the team’s best penalty killer, smothering a point-blank shot by Boston center Pavel Zacha from the top of the crease.

The Wild went up by two via a series of fortunate events, when a long-range blast by Matt Boldy deflected off a Bruin’s skate and went wide of the net. But the puck caromed hard off the end boards and slipped right to the side of the net, where Kaprizov was waiting to whack the puck off the far goalpost and in.

Hartman made it 3-0 on the Wild’s second power play of the game, scoring his second goal in as many games by finishing off a 2-on-1 rush with Brock Faber.

With the Wild in complete control, Alex Steeves ruined Gustavsson’s bid for a shutout, scoring in the latter half of the third. Andrew Peeke scored Boston’s other goal in the final second of the game.

The win may have come at a cost for the Wild, as second-line forward Marcus Johansson left in the second period with an apparent lower body injury and did not return. Johansson came into the game third on the team in goals with 11.

Swayman had 25 saves for Boston, which came to Minnesota on a four-game win streak.

The Wild make their only trip to Boston on March 28 for their rematch with the Bruins.

The Wild have a day off before concluding their four-game homestand on Tuesday when the Washington Capitals make their only visit to St. Paul this season. The teams played in Washington back in October, with the Capitals prevailing 5-1.

Briefly

There was a polite round of applause during a timeout in the first period when Bruins center Marat Khusnutdinov was shown on the arena’s video screen with a “welcome back” message. A second round pick by the Wild in the 2020 draft, Khusnutdinov had 11 points in 73 games for Minnesota. He was sent to Boston last March in the trade that brought Justin Brazeau to the Wild for a brief stint. Kaprizov admitted that he and Khusnutdinov were out for a drive in the Twin Cities on Friday night when word of the Hughes trade came down.