Jimmy Butler fell to the ground and took an official with him. At the same time, his three-point attempt was passed through the hoop, the beginning of a four-point game in the fourth quarter on Monday.

Moments later, Butler stole a pass for LeBron James and sailed for an easy dunk.

Despite all the controversy surrounding his request for exchange and his sitting games for "pain in general," Butler said when he spoke. Nobody challenged Butler's "You need me" urge to general manager Scott Layden when Butler blew up his first appearance at the Wolves practice in October, and Wednesday was another demonstration.

But as long as the Wolves needed Butler, and for him too, he played Monday night with 24 points in 43 minutes, it was still not enough for the Wolves since the Lakers won a 114-110 victory.

James finished with a near triple-double of 24 points, 10 rebounds and nine assists. The Wolves had a strong night of ground shots, including three points, making a franchise record of 20 (out of 40). Derrick Rose added 31 points to the Wolves, including seven three.

Kyle Kuzma scored a 3 with 1:53 to go to give the Lakers a 111-104 lead, but Rose chained by three in the next minute to draw the Wolves into 1 at 111-110 with 1:06 left . The Lakers then missed three times but got the rebound twice and the Wolves hit the ball off the court on the third occasion.

"That's the problem, we need to fix it," Wolves coach Tom Thibodeau said, "We can not be overtaken like that, until we do that." we will not succeed. "

The Wolves made a mistake on Kuzma and he hit one of the two with 8.8 seconds left to lead 112-110. Rose missed three wins in the game with 1.2 seconds and Josh Hart hit free throws for the final margin, leaving the Wolves 0-7 on the road this season.

"For you to ask the question," Rose said of her last three-point attempt, "you had to see something, do you feel me? No disrespect, but they will not give me this call. They did not call me that. So I just have to get used to it.

Striker Taj Gibson was sure he saw something too: "He was defiled. It's definitely dirty.

Karl-Anthony Towns had a hectic opening few minutes of the game with a block of JaVale McGee, a block of James, a pointer to three pointers, another deflection when James dribbled and an offensive foul shot. The Towns game was indicative of the wolf as a whole during the first quarter. They performed without fault on the offensive side, hitting six of their first eight three points.

Rose and Andrew Wiggins each hit a pair of tracks while Towns and Butler added one. The Wolves led by no fewer than nine players in the quarter, but the Lakers came back with the new acquisition of Tyson Chandler. But that's Hart who caused the most damage to the Wolves. He struck three times to three for the quarterback for the Lakers, who reduced the deficit by nine points to 32-30 to start the second.

To start the second quarter, Thibodeau turned to a formation he favored at the very beginning: Butler and four bench players. This configuration was maintained until Thibodeau could mix the starters in the formation, and the starters seemed not to miss at times. Each of them reached double points at the end of the half and shot a combined total of 25 out of 38 from the field and 11 out of 15 from the three-point range for 67 points. The 11 three points tied a club record for most of the three points in a half, which they established in 2010.

Maybe the starting unit has enjoyed some continuity. For the five games before Wednesday, the Wolves used five unique starting lineups, the first time since November 2014.

The only problem was that the Wolves could not stop to keep a lead.

The Lakers shot 52% of the field and added 13 points to second chance as the Wolves' problems with the defender continued. The Lakers grabbed nine offensive rebounds in the first period.