MINNEAPOLIS _ First, a guy named Frank Kaminsky helped ruin Karl-Anthony Towns and his college team's perfect season when Wisconsin beat Kentucky in the 2015 NCAA Final Four semifinals.
Then Kaminsky and his Charlotte Hornets went and ruined Towns' 21st birthday party by beating him and the Timberwolves 115-108 Tuesday night at Target Center.
Kaminsky was a featured player in the fourth quarter on a night when Hornets teammate Kemba Walker scored 30 points and Kaminsky delivered 20 points off the bench.
The Wolves had led by as many as 14 points in the second quarter, but another lousy third quarter doomed them once again.
Outscored 36-17 in that third quarter, they trailed by as many as 10 points, went back ahead by eight points in the third quarter before they finally succumbed down the stretch in the fourth quarter.
Towns scored 21 points on his birthday night and Andrew Wiggins led the Wolves with 29 points, 18 of them in the second half.
Wiggins started the game by making one of his first seven field-goal attempts and scored only two points through the game's first 20 minutes.
Trailing 95-92 with fewer than six minutes left, the Wolves tied the score on Towns' 3-point shot, but Hornets star guard Kemba Walker came right back and scored the next four points and Charlotte led 99-95 with fewer than five minutes left.
The Hornets led by five points again twice, including 105-100 with 2:43 remaining before the Wolves got within two points but could get no closer.
The Wolves entered Tuesday's game by leading the league in several first-quarter scoring categories, including points (31.8 ppg) and offensive rating.
The Hornets, in turn, had only outscored their opponents twice in the first nine games and were almost just as accomplished failing behind by double digits in the opening quarter as the Wolves were building such big leads.
Yet Charlotte came to Target Center with a 6-3 record while the Wolves were 3-6.
Both did so in good measure primarily because of their third-quarter play: The Hornets entered with the NBA's best third-quarter scoring differential, 7.1 points.
The Wolves, meanwhile, were last in the league in that category, with a minus 8.0.
Both only enhanced Tuesday what already had been.
The Hornets erased a 58-46 halftime deficit by outscoring the Wolves 36-17 in that third quarter.
They did it with a 15-2 run that started the quarter and gave them a brief 61-60 lead before the Wolves pushed back and reclaimed the lead, building it back to 69-61.
The Hornets simply responded with a 21-3 run that put them back in the lead, at 82-72 lead with 1:10 left in the third quarter.
Charlotte led 82-75 by quarter's end and still was leading by seven points when Wiggins went back to work, bringing the Wolves back by bookending a 15-7 run of their own with a 3-pointer at the front end and another at the back end.
The last one _ his third made three of the night _ gave the Wolves a 92-91 lead with fewer than 7 { minutes left.
But big Roy Hibbert reached up with one hand and scored on a dunk to put the Hornets ahead again and Nicolas Batum added a driving layup and Charlotte led 95-92 with fewer than six minutes left.
