MINNEAPOLIS – Gophers men’s basketball fans hoping to be reassured by an expected thrashing of Wisconsin-Green Bay on Saturday night at Williams Arena were likely left a little queasy after Minnesota escaped with a 72-65 overtime victory.

Jaylen Crocker-Johnson, who hadn’t hit on any of his first three three-point shots, drained his fourth attempt of the night from outside the top of the key with 90 seconds remaining in the extra session to put his team up, 66-63. The Colorado State transfer then sank a running one-hander from the right side to push the lead to 68-63 with 50 seconds to play on a night where Minnesota shot 41% from the floor.

“They were constantly changing defenses, something they hadn’t shown and we weren’t prepared for,” said first-year Gophers coach Niko Medved, whose team improved to 3-1 while dropping the Phoenix to 1-4. “But we didn’t let that frustration get to us. We hung in there down the stretch.

“Winning is hard. We’ll take it.”

Gophers senior guard Cade Tyson, a transfer from the University of North Carolina, led the hosts with 27 points, followed by Crocker-Johnson, a junior, with 11 points. Sophomore guard Isaac Asuma scored nine.

“You go through adversity in a season and it came down to a five-minute game and we found a way to get it done,” said Medved, whose team hosts Chicago State (0-4) on Tuesday. “This is going to be great for us, because teams are going to throw a curve ball at you in a season. This is something we’re going to build on.”

Doug Gottlieb, Green Bay’s second-year coach and host of a national radio show, said he got caught with “wonky lineups” late in the second half and during overtime. Sometimes too small and sometimes too big.

“By overtime, kids are exhausted and nobody shot the ball well,” said Gottlieb, whose record with the Phoenix fell to 5-32. “In overtime, it got crazy physical and we didn’t execute and we got thirsty, with too many guys coming towards the ball on offense when what we wanted was to spread (Minnesota) out.”

Minnesota converted 20 of 39 free-throws, leading Medved to joke that he felt he was “in the Twilight Zone” watching players he knows can regularly convert from the charity stripe do otherwise. He added that he was inclined to let Crocker-Johnson continue to shoot from the field, having watched him do it well last season.

“Sometimes the worst thing you can do is try to shoot your way out (of a slump), but I know Jalen will snap out of it,” Medved said. “When the game’s on the line and he was open, he had the guts to step up and knock it down. You can’t play scared.”

The Gophers hit on just 29 percent of their field-goal attempts during the first half but sank six of their first 10 shots from the floor after intermission. They entered the break trailing, 27-23, to a foe that at one point last winter endured a 20-game losing streak and which fell by 19 points at St. Thomas earlier this week.

Minnesota earned its first lead of the second half at 33-32 and five minutes into the stanza. The Gophers fell behind twice more before surging ahead at 46-45 with 6 minutes, 25 seconds remaining in the second half. The game became tied, 54-54, with two minutes remaining in the half.

“I told our guys we’d get a really spirited effort from them,” Medved said, noting that one of the Phoenix players suffered a serious injury against the Tommies and that he expected the player’s teammates to rally around that loss.

Minnesota led, 60-56, with 18 seconds remaining in the second half, but Green Bay’s Preston Ruedinger sank a three-point shot with 12 seconds on the clock. Then, after Tyson hit a free-throw to make Minnesota’s lead 61-59 with 10 seconds to play, Ruedinger made a driving layup with one second remaining to force overtime.

Ruedinger and Marcus Hall led the Phoenix by each scoring 15 points.

“It was a frustrating game, but I think our 11 new guys will settle in and we’re going to be ok going forward,” Medved said. “I’m a process guy. It’s unrealistic to think you’ll jump on teams early all the time.”

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The Minnesota Timberwolves had won four straight games and six of their last seven after beating the Sacramento Kings again on Friday.

But that success was built upon one of the softest schedules an NBA team will play this season. The combined records of the teams Minnesota beat in those six games is 12-38.

Still, the Wolves were playing well. Their defensive intensity had picked up in that span and they sport one of the most efficient offenses in the NBA. It was about time to see again how they stacked up against a legitimate foe.

The answer: Not well.

The Denver Nuggets were without two starters on the wing, as both Christian Braun and Cam Johnson were out with injuries, which severely strained a rotation that’s been one of the best in the league this season. No matter, what was available of Denver’s core outworked and outexecuted the Timberwolves, particularly in the second half en route to a 123-112 victory on Saturday.

Minnesota is now 0-5 this season against teams with record north of .500.

The Wolves led 60-55 at the break after taking advantage of the minutes played by the likes of Julian Strawther and Spencer Jones off Denver’s bench. But when Aaron Gordon, Jamal Murray and Nikola Jokic shared the floor, the Wolves were handled all game.

Suddenly, defensive possessions required an extra rotation. The offense faced more resistance from a defense that possessed gameplan discipline. All things you’d expect to see against playoff teams.

Minnesota (8-5) wasn’t up to snuff, as was the case earlier this season against the likes of the Lakers and Knicks.

The Wolves allowed 68 second-half points as they were picked apart possession by possession.

Anthony Edwards struggled on both ends of the floor all game. He was passive offensively while returning to old, over-dribbling ways while getting lost off the ball on defense.

Luckily for Minnesota, three more gimmes are on the way. The Wolves next two opponents: The Mavericks, and Wizards.

Their combined records: 4-21.

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For those desperately searching for signs that the Minnesota Wild are turning a corner, perhaps Saturday’s 2-0 win over Anaheim provided a few.

And for a team that has struggled to find consistent offense in the season’s first six weeks, perhaps getting it done with defense is just the way things will need to be, at least for now.

In stifling the normally high-scoring Ducks, Minnesota got 28 saves from Jesper Wallstedt — one half of what is looking more and more like a true goalie tandem — as the younger of the Wild’s two Swedish goalies improved to 4-0-2 as a starter. It was the second shutout of the season for Wallstedt, and the third of his career.

The Wild got all the offense they would need from Marcus Johansson, and finished things off with a Matt Boldy empty-net goal. With the win, Minnesota is 8-7-4 and back above .500 for the first time in a month.

Minnesota’s power play, which has been among the NHL’s best this season, went 0 for 7.

After the Ducks killed an early Mason McTavish high-sticking penalty, the Anaheim center once again got the blade of his stick up too high, catching Wild rookie forward Danila Yurov near his right eye. Yurov dropped to the ice immediately and was helped down the tunnel by the team’s trainers, while McTavish returned to the penalty box, this time for four minutes.

Anaheim emerged from the double minor unscathed, allowing just two Wild shots. Yurov returned to the game with a little under two minutes left in the scoreless opening period.

Early in the middle frame, Johansson’s productive month continued. After being held off the score sheet in Minnesota’s previous game, snapping a career-best nine-game point streak, his goal off a set-up from Boldy gave Johansson a dozen points in the Wild’s past 11 games.

The Wild were without winger Vladimir Tarasenko for the first time this season, after he was scratched due to a lower-body injury. Liam Ohgren, recalled from Iowa earlier in the day on Saturday, took Tarasenko’s spot on the third line, which began the game with Yurov at center and Vinnie Hinostroza on the other wing.

The Ducks got their second four-minute, high-sticking penalty of the game in the third when Nikita Nesterenko’s follow-through on a check included the shaft of his stick tagging Wild defenseman Daemon Hunt in the face. Hunt left a trail of blood on his way to the locker room but was back on the bench before the power play ended.

Petr Mrazek finished with 29 saves for Anaheim, which will host the Wild on Jan. 2 at the Honda Center and returns to Minnesota to close the regular season on April 14.

The Wild’s five-game homestand continues on Sunday evening when the Vegas Golden Knights make their first visit to Minnesota this season. The game faces off at 5 p.m.

Briefly

Two of the Ducks’ players with Minnesota connections were unavailable on Saturday night. Ryan Poehling, who is from Lakeville and played collegiately at St. Cloud State, missed his second consecutive game with an upper-body injury. Mikael Granlund, who was the Wild’s first round pick (ninth overall) in 2010 and spent his first six NHL seasons in Minnesota, was scratched after suffering a lower-body injury during Anaheim’s loss in Detroit on Thursday.

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Class 3A

Waseca 14, Dilworth-Glyndon-Felton 13: William Mansfield was the hero for Waseca on Saturday. After Dilworth-Glyndon-Felton scored a touchdown to trim Waseca’s lead to 14-13 with nine minutes to play, Mansfield blocked the ensuing extra point to keep the Bluejays on top.

Dilworth-Glyndon-Felton got the ball back and drove inside the Waseca 30-yard-line on its final possessions, but Brady McKenna made a couple key plays to secure the Bluejays victory – stuffing a rushing attempt on third down and delivering the game-sealing sack on fourth down.

Class A

Minneota 28, Mahnomen/Waubun 14

Minneota stretched its winning streak to 45 games and punched its ticket to another Class A Prep Bowl.

Kellen Bradley rushed for 143 yards and a score for the Vikings, while quarterback Tristen Sussner added a pair of rushing touchdowns.

Minneota tallied just two more total yards of offense (242) than Mahnomen/Waubun but led by as many as 20 in the final frame.

Breckenridge 28, Murray County Central 21

David Erlandson ran for 123 yards and three scores, the last of which was a 1-yard plunge in the final two minutes of the game to send Breckenridge to the Class A Prep Bowl, where it’ll meet Minneota next week.

Carson Lewis ran for 105 yards and two touchdowns for Murray County Central.

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