MINNEAPOLIS _ Bypassed by the Timberwolves in the 2013 draft because they deemed him too small to play off the ball in the backcourt and not defensive enough, CJ McCollum was plenty good enough Sunday in Portland's 95-89 victory at Target Center.
Moved over to point guard because Damian Lillard was injured for the fourth consecutive game, McCollum scored 43 points, 31 of them through the first three quarters for a team that won for just the third time in its last 14 games.
The Wolves owned the ninth overall pick in that 2013 draft and coveted shooting guard Kentavious Caldwell-Pope. When Detroit took Caldwell-Pope with the eighth pick, then-Wolves president of basketball operations Flip Saunders worked a trade with Utah rather than take arguably the next highest rated player, McCollum, with that ninth pick.
Instead, the Wolves drafted point guard Trey Burke for Utah with that ninth pick and dealt his rights to the Jazz for the rights to Shabazz Muhammad (14th overall pick) and Gorgui Dieng (21st overall pick).
Leading by 14 points late in the first half and trailing by eight points with fewer than six points left, the Wolves pulled within 83-82 with 4:13 remaining before McCollum's clutch three-pointer gave the Blazers an 88-82 lead with 2:34 left.
The Wolves never got closer than four points again in a fourth quarter when rookie Kris Dunn played down the stretch in place of Ricky Rubio, likely because Dunn's defense gave them more of a fighting chance against McCollum.
It still wasn't nearly enough.
When the Wolves got within four points again at 85-81 with 54 seconds left, McCollum simply dribbled seconds off the clock and then got into the lane for a pullup jumper that put Portland back ahead by six points with 34 seconds remaining.
Andrew Wiggins led the Wolves with 24 points.
The Wolves trailed 24-23 after a quarter and led by 12 at halftime after a 26-13 second quarter, but the third quarter vexed them yet again, as it has done so often this season.
The Blazers outscored them 32-15 in the third, turning a 49-37 deficit at intermission into a 69-64 lead after three quarters.
McCollum had 31 of his points by then after the Blazers reversed course by starting the second half by scoring the first seven points and then they just kept going.
When McCollum scored five consecutive points early in the fourth quarter, Portland had stretched its lead to 74-67 with 9:53 left.
But the Wolves scored six unanswered points to get within 74-73 before the Blazers responded with a 9-2 run of their own while McCollum was on the bench resting.
Portland led 83-75 with 5:38 left before the Wolves pushed back yet again, scoring seven consecutive points again with Zach LaVine's three-point shot right in the middle of it all.
McCollum starred while Lillard missed his fourth consecutive game because of a sprained ankle. The Blazers are 2-2 in those games and now 3-11 in their last 14 games.
