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MINNEAPOLIS –– "In the playoffs, there is no room for error," LeBron James said.
The Minnesota Timberwolves shot just 36.1% from three in their 116-104 Game 3 win, yet they still carved up Los Angeles with a 48.4% clinic from the field.
How? By pummeling the paint, exploiting the Lakers' skeletal interior defense like wolves tearing at exposed ribs.
Playing small, playing scrambly, playing without—the Lakers tried to stop a tidal wave with a stop sign. The Wolves outscored them 56-26 in the paint.
Jaden McDaniels, a 6-foot-9 power forward with springs in his sneakers, danced through the paint for a career-high 30 points.
Anthony Edwards added 29, and his fourth-quarter daggers—two threes in the clutch—sliced through the Lakers' fraying resolve.
When the Wolves broke containment, it was over. Minnesota's height and athleticism aren't just weapons but a verdict.
Meanwhile, Luka Dončić, pale and perspiring, played through a stomach bug that left him heaving all day. His 17 points on 6-for-16 shooting felt heroic and hollow, a flickering candle in a hurricane.
Ever the Atlas, James shouldered 38 points and 10 rebounds, his fourth-quarter flurry of threes briefly igniting hope—until the Lakers' mistakes roared back.
Nineteen turnovers. Nineteen.
Minnesota feasted on those gifts, converting them into 28 points, including a fast-break fiesta of 21.
The Lakers' defense is a revolving door.
"They won the possession battle," Austin Reaves admitted, his words clipped with frustration. "You give up double-digit opportunities, it's hard to win."
Harder still when your rotations are late, your closeouts are limp, and your rim protection is… nonexistent. The Wolves lived in the paint; their drives relentless, their finishes ferocious.
"Our closeouts in the first quarter were god-awful," coach JJ Redick grumbled, his tone simultaneously exasperated and exhausted. "If you give up blow-bys, we're going to give up something—a three or a shot at the rim."
The Lakers' lack of size became a punchline. McDaniels soared, Edwards exploded, and the Timberwolves' height advantage was as glaring as their 13-1 closing run.
James distilled the disaster: "In the postseason, there is no room for error."
No room for lethargic rotations. No room for careless passes. No room for a defense that treats the paint like a welcome mat.
Yet here Los Angeles was in Game 3, outmuscled and outmaneuvered, their flaws laid bare under the Target Center lights. The Lakers' gamble on small ball—a strategy that sparkled in spurts—became a suicide pact.
Without a true rim protector, every defensive lapse metastasizes. Every turnover became a transition tsunami.
Even Dončić's grit couldn't save them. "He gave it everything he had," Reaves said.
But everything wasn't enough. Not when McDaniels was dunking on air. Not when Edwards was rewriting endings.
The Lakers' path forward is littered with questions. How do they fix the unfixable? How can they guard the unguardable? How can they survive a series when their defense is a riddle wrapped in a mistake inside a collapse?
James' words echoed, haunting and hollow: No room for error.
On Friday, the Lakers' errors built a house in Minneapolis, and the Wolves blew it down.