Al Jefferson had 22 points and eight rebounds to help Utah keep its playoff hopes alive with a 96-80 victory over the Minnesota Timberwolves on Monday night, setting up one more must-win game in the season finale on Wednesday.

“It comes down to one game now,” Jefferson said. “It’s a big game. The only thing we can worry about is what we can control, going out there and trying to take care of the game, and trying to win, and just leave the rest up to the Lakers, I guess.”

Mo Williams had 15 points and seven assists for the Jazz, who needed a win to avoid being eliminated in the Western Conference playoff race.

To get into the playoffs, the Jazz need to win at Memphis on Wednesday and for the Los Angeles Lakers to lose at home against Houston that night. Utah owns the tiebreaker after beating the Lakers two out of three times this season.

“I guess I have to try and get in touch with Kevin McHale and tell him to handle it for me,” said Jefferson, who played for the Rockets’ coach when both were in Minnesota.

Derrick Williams had 18 points and six rebounds for the Timberwolves, who were missing center Nikola Pekovic because of a bruised left calf.

The Jazz entered the night clinging to the postseason picture, down 1½ games to the Lakers with two to play.

For a team that could have as many as nine expiring contracts this summer, the Jazz are desperately chasing one more playoff appearance. Jefferson, Paul Millsap, Mo Williams and Randy Foye all could be looking for new teams when the season ends, with a bevy of young players waiting to assume larger roles next year.

They’ve won nine of their last 11 games since a four-game losing streak in the middle of last month threatened to bury them.

“Talk about this group of guys, man, the character that they have, there was no quit in this group,” coach Tyrone Corbin said. “The guys just continued to work and put ourselves in a position to get back when we were struggling there.”

Utah didn’t play all that well early, but it was just good enough to stay on top of a Timberwolves team that is slogging to the finish of another long season. The Wolves shot just 33 percent in the first quarter, and without Pekovic patrolling the paint they didn’t grab an offensive rebound until late in the third quarter.

A 13-4 run by Minnesota cut Utah’s lead to three points late in the third quarter, but once again the Wolves had no answer for Jefferson. The former Wolf scored 40 against the Wolves in a 107-100 win on Friday night in Salt Lake City and continued to attack the team’s soft middle on Monday night. He scored six straight points after Minnesota’s run to give the Jazz some breathing room again, and they never looked back.

Foye scored 14 points for the Jazz.

“You want to finish up better than that,” coach Rick Adelman said of the home finale. “I know they had something to play for, but it was our last home game. I thought we should have had better effort, but we didn’t.”

The Timberwolves have one game left in what has been a miserable, injury-plagued season. They will enter this offseason as they have every one since 2004 — with a spot in the lottery coming in June and plenty of questions about the roster and who will be back to lead it. Owner Glen Taylor has been mum on president David Kahn’s future. Kahn has a team option on his contract for next season.

Coach Rick Adelman has two years left on his deal, but has considered stepping down to help his wife, Mary Kay, who is being treated for seizures. Her condition caused him to miss 11 games earlier this season. She is due to meet with doctors again shortly after the season ends and Adelman is hoping her condition will continue to stabilize. Before the game, Adelman said he was going forward with the idea that he would be back next season and hoped to have a definitive answer in the next couple of weeks.

“I think what happens with Mary Kay or any of that, that certainly would turn things in a different direction,” Adelman said. “Right now I don’t see that (happening), but I’m going to wait and see until we talk to the doctors and see what direction they’ve decided we need to go at this point. Then we’ll move from there.”

Game notes

Wolves PG Ricky Rubio had a quiet night with six points on 2-for-9 shooting and four assists. … The Wolves finish the season with a game at San Antonio on Wednesday. … It was just the 13th win on the road for the Jazz this season. They’ve won three straight away from home.

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In a matchup of Western Conference contenders that had a playoff feel to it, Gasol tipped in Zach Randolph’s miss with less than a second left in overtime Wednesday night to give Memphis a 90-89 win over the Thunder.

Gasol was so excited about the winning basket that he dropped a not-suitable-for-television expletive in the live postgame interview.

“I saw Zach going baseline and just went for the rebound and got lucky with the tip,” Gasol said. “It’s an emotional game. It’s a team that we like playing against, and a team that knows us very well. It was a gritty game.”

The excitement carried over into the Grizzlies locker room where whoops and hollers could be heard in the hallway.

Gasol would have never had a chance at the winning tip if not for Jerryd Bayless connecting on a 3-pointer from the top of the key for Memphis with 3.7 seconds left in regulation to send the teams into overtime tied at 83. Bayless scored 10 of his 20 points in the fourth quarter.

After Gasol’s tip put the Grizzlies ahead with 0.9 seconds left, Russell Westbrook’s desperation shot from past halfcourt was off the mark and Memphis walked away with its 16th victory in 19 games.

“We win in a variety of ways. It’s never pretty,” said Mike Conley, who led the Grizzlies with a season-high 24 points. “That’s that grit-and-grind motto right there. We just find a way to win however it is. (This) was one of those wins.”

Randolph added 15 points and 18 rebounds, giving him 7,001 career rebounds, while Gasol had 14 points and 15 rebounds.

Kevin Durant led the Thunder with 32 points, including 15 in the third quarter to help Oklahoma City take its first lead. Westbrook scored 20 on 7-of-25 shooting from the field. Kevin Martin added 17 points, but no other Thunder player had more than seven.

“It was just one of those games, probably 10 of them a year, where nobody deserves to lose the game, but we were on the bad side of that,” Thunder coach Scott Brooks said.

Oklahoma City, coming off a 114-110 loss to Denver on Tuesday, scored the first two points in overtime on a pair of free throws from Thabo Sefolosha. Memphis then scored five straight, including three from Gasol. The other points came on a tip-in by Tony Allen with 2:42 left. Officials initially ruled basket interference on Allen, but gave him the points after a replay review showed the ball was outside the cylinder.

The Thunder answered the Memphis push with a 6-footer in the lane from Durant and a layup by Westbrook with 13.6 seconds left for an 89-88 lead.

That set the stage for Gasol’s final tip-in when Randolph missed a 7-footer.

“I don’t think it was anything defensively,” Westbrook said of the final play. “They got a tip-in and, unfortunately, it was (less than a second) on the clock.”

“We had chances to win, to fight back, the whole game,” Durant said, later adding: “They hit a big shot. Two big shots.”

The teams have been rivals since the second round of the Western Conference playoffs two seasons ago, when the Thunder dispatched Memphis in seven games, including a triple-overtime win at FedExForum.

“It reminded me a lot of the triple-overtime game,” Conley said of the intensity. “Guys were hitting big shots back and forth, having different guys step up. The intensity, the crowd, all of that. It had the same kind of atmosphere. It came down to the end, and we got the win.”

The game featured physical play, disputed calls and technicals. Westbrook got a technical early for griping; Randolph got one late in the fourth when he thought he was fouled under the Memphis basket.

The physical play was coupled with defensive pressure that resulted in low shooting percentages. The Thunder ended the night at a season-low 35.7 percent from the field, while Memphis managed to shoot only slightly better at 36 percent. Oklahoma City, which entered the game as one of the NBA’s best 3-point shooting teams at 38.3 percent, managed only 2-of-18 shooting from outside the arc.

“Both teams played extremely hard and physical, and you can tell,” Brooks said. “It was hard to get baskets; it was hard to get on offense.”

There were four ties and 14 lead changes in the game.

The Grizzlies maintained their hold on third place in the Western Conference standings and pulled within three games of the Thunder for second.

Once Oklahoma City caught Memphis behind Durant’s shooting late in the third quarter, the teams exchanged leads throughout the fourth, eventually leaving them deadlocked at the end of regulation.

“It is a good matchup,” Westbrook said of the rivalry. “It was physical. It’s intense. It was a playoff atmosphere. Unfortunately, we couldn’t win.”

Memphis shot well early to build a 10-point lead in the first half before carrying a 44-38 lead into halftime.

Durant and Martin had 10 points apiece at the break. Randolph had 12 for Memphis.

The defensive intensity continued through the early stages of the third period as the teams were a combined 4 of 22 through the first 6 minutes.

But the Thunder kept cutting into the lead as Durant took over offensively, scoring 15 in the quarter, including 13 straight points for the Thunder, eventually giving Oklahoma City its first lead at 57-56 late in the third.

Two free throws from Gasol gave Memphis the lead back at 58-57 entering the fourth.

“I knew when we were not making shots early in the game, we would keep fighting, playing aggressive and give ourselves a chance to win,” Brooks said. “That’s what we’ve done for a lot of years now, and that is not going to change.”

Game notes

Thunder F Serge Ibaka played after taking some stitches in his head against Denver on Tuesday night. … Memphis F Darrell Arthur missed his ninth straight game with neck and back soreness. … The Grizzlies won the season series 2-1. … Oklahoma City scored 15 points in the first quarter, a season low for the opening period. . Memphis has lost only once in five overtime games. The Thunder dropped to 4-2. . Oklahoma City had a season-low nine assists. The Grizzlies matched their season low with 11 assists.

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For a .500 team, the Lakers are looking pretty good lately. Bryant is the biggest reason why.

Bryant scored 11 of his 34 points in the fourth quarter and hit the go-ahead layup with 9 seconds left, leading the Lakers back to .500 for the first time in more than two months with a 99-98 victory over the Atlanta Hawks on Sunday night.

Steve Blake stole Smith’s final pass in the waning seconds for the Lakers (30-30), who blew a 16-point lead in the second half before Bryant scored their last six points.

After Bryant scored the Lakers’ final basket while driving directly at Smith, Blake swiped Smith’s desperation pass from underneath Los Angeles’ basket. Bryant threw the ball high in the air to run out the clock on Los Angeles’ seventh straight home victory over the Hawks since 2006.

“I just had to attack,” Bryant said. “I wanted to attack and just go right at them. Take the game to them. Be aggressive. Be physical. And it worked out.”

Steve Nash had 15 points and 10 assists, while Dwight Howard added 11 points and 15 rebounds in the Lakers’ 13th win in 18 games. Los Angeles hung on for a quality win over the Hawks, a near-certain playoff team with ample motivation to knock off the high-profile Lakers.

Kobe wouldn’t allow it, making one big play after another down the stretch. Afterward, he repeatedly compared himself to a fine wine — only getting better with age.

“It was more of a message to my team here, to kind of have that will, that hunger, to push through it by any means necessary,” he said. “It’s just a challenge. I wouldn’t even really categorize it as fun. The fun comes in the challenge, and we’re up for it.”

The Lakers hadn’t been at .500 since Dec. 28, when they followed a win over Portland with six consecutive losses. They’ve spent the past six weeks digging themselves out of the latest hole in their rut-filled season, culminating in a lengthy stretch of recent solid play despite the absence of injured 7-footer Pau Gasol.

If the Lakers manage to upset Oklahoma City on Tuesday night, they would have their first winning record since Nov. 20, when they beat Brooklyn in coach Mike D’Antoni’s debut to go 6-5.

Al Horford scored 24 points and Smith had 19 for the Hawks, who had won four straight before consecutive road losses to the Suns and Lakers. Atlanta hasn’t beaten the Lakers anywhere since March 31, 2010.

Smith relished his matchup with Bryant, even if he got the short end of it.

“He’s been doing it for a long time, so you have to respect what he brings to the table,” Smith said. “He’s an assassin. He wants that moment. But from a defensive standpoint, I love taking a challenge like that and try to step up and try to make it tough for him. It was kind of like a tug-of-war match. We were going back and forth, and they made one more play than we did to win the game. I live for moments like this.”

Bryant put the Lakers up 96-95 with 2:18 to play on that ferocious dunk. After turnovers by both teams, Jeff Teague reclaimed the lead for Atlanta with 45 seconds left on a floating layup in traffic.

After Bryant hit two free throws, Horford put the Hawks back ahead with a dunk on a backdoor pass from Smith with 26.7 seconds left. But Bryant drove around Horford and right into Smith at the rim, willing the ball over his defense.

“There’s a reason why he’s the best player in the game,” Horford said of Bryant. “He did what he usually does, and we didn’t do a good enough job on him. It’s disappointing. We thought we worked hard and put ourselves in a position to win. We just had too many mistakes down the stretch.”

Devin Harris scored 12 of his 16 points in a three-minute spree late in the third quarter while Atlanta erased Los Angeles’ big lead.

Game notes

The Hawks finish their trip Monday night in Denver. … Atlanta coach Larry Drew was able to attend his son’s final UCLA home game on Saturday thanks to the fortunate coincidence in the Hawks’ schedule. Drew considers Los Angeles home after playing for the Clippers and Lakers, followed by a lengthy stint as a Lakers assistant coach in the 1990s prior to Phil Jackson’s arrival. … Novak Djokovic visited the Lakers’ locker room with fellow tennis player Justin Gimelstob before the game. One day after winning the Dubai Championships halfway around the globe, Djokovic spoke at length with Howard, who claims he won a school tennis tournament as a kid.

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