SAN FRANCISCO – Tuesday night’s 104-101 Timberwolves win over the Warriors took all of 1 minute, 43 seconds to become anything but a normal game.

That was the time when Warriors guard Klay Thompson and Wolves forward Jaden McDaniels began grabbing each other’s jerseys and shoving each other near midcourt.

Warriors forward Draymond Green, who has had a prickly relationship with Wolves center Rudy Gobert, then seized on the opportunity to put Gobert in a chokehold and dragged him toward the Warriors bench after Gobert tried to pull Thompson away from McDaniels.

McDaniels, Green and Thompson were all ejected, and what began as a potential easy Wolves victory because of Stephen Curry’s absence to a sore right knee turned into one of the most emotionally taxing games of their young season.

Their seventh victory in a row gave the Wolves a 2-0 record in the NBA in-season tournament, with their final two group play games at home over the next two weeks.

So far, the Wolves have passed most tests of maturity that have come their way.

Tuesday represented a new kind of challenge — keeping their emotions in check after tensions boiled over in the early brouhaha.

The Wolves passed the test, barely. They needed a fourth-quarter comeback on a messy, discombobulated night on both ends of the floor, but the end result was their seventh straight victory, none filled with as much drama as this one.

When the Wolves offense was struggling, Karl-Anthony Towns came to the rescue with 33 points, including 11 in the fourth quarter. The Wolves defense clamped down enough late on a night in which it was otherwise allowing the likes of Brandin Podziemski (23 points) to score.

The Wolves rode the hot hand of Towns to erase a seven-point deficit entering the fourth quarter. A Towns three-pointer put the Wolves ahead 99-98 with 1:07 to play, and they managed a stop on the next possession.

Following a Towns missed three, Gobert got his revenge by blocking a three attempt by Dario Saric on the Wolves’ next defensive possession. Then with 8.6 seconds remaining, Anthony Edwards (20 points) found Mike Conley in the left corner for a game-clinching three-pointer, a make that caused the Wolves bench to erupt.

It capped quite the tumultuous night.

The footage of Green coming over and putting Gobert in a chokehold quickly made its way around social media. After McDaniels and Thompson began scuffling, Gobert came over to pull Thompson away from McDaniels, but when he did that, Green put Gobert in a hammerlock and dragged him toward the Warriors bench as multiple Wolves players like Towns and Edwards and even Warriors coach Steve Kerr tried to get him off Gobert.

The incident resulted in technical fouls and ejections for McDaniels and Thompson and a flagrant foul penalty and ejection for Green.

Green and Gobert have a bit of a history. When Green punched former teammate Jordan Poole during a practice before last season, Gobert tweeted “Insecurity is always loud.” When Gobert took a swing at Kyle Anderson in the final regular-season game for the Wolves last season, Green fired back with the same tweet. Green appeared as if he were using the altercation Tuesday to take out some long-simmering frustration on Gobert.

The Warriors did not replays of the incident in the arena and the crowd turned Gobert into an instant villain, and afterward the Wolves looked out of sorts for much of the first half.

The scuffle left the Warriors without the three cornerstones to their four championships with Curry already out because of a right knee injury. But that didn’t mean it was going to be easy for the Wolves. They committed 10 turnovers and their No. 1 rated defense allowed players like Podziemski and Saric to score. Podziemski scored 12 in the first half, while Saric added 11.

The Wolves allowed Golden State to score nine second-chance points, and the Warriors led 59-54 at halftime.

The Wolves have played well in third quarters recently, but on Tuesday it was a continuation of their issues. They fell behind as many as 12 points before cutting it to four late in the quarter. With seconds to play, Towns grabbed a defensive rebound, only to throw the outlet pass to Podziemski, who nailed a three at the buzzer. But they weren’t done and overcame everything else that had transpired the rest of the night.