Minnesota was sans four of its most important offensive players Saturday at home against Portland and won anyway.

Two big reasons why were the scoring output of Naz Reid and Jaden McDaniels.

Reid’s 23 points weren’t a surprise by any stretch. The big man’s bag of offensive tricks is deep.

His production is often linked to volume.

McDaniels, on the other hand, has always been more of an offensive enigma.

The potential for scoring prowess was always there, but the results have long been up and down, with the latter appearing far more frequently.

The lockdown defensive wing has struggled mightily at times with his 3-point shot, missing the bulk of his open looks from beyond the arc. And he often failed to provide much else on that end of the floor.

Until recently.

McDaniels’ 30-point outburst against Portland may have been the highlight of his past month, but it was just another example of the offensive production that’s become far more consistent for Minnesota.

Over the last month — a 17-game sample size — McDaniels is averaging 14.9 points on 53% shooting. He has scored in single digits just twice in that span, after failing to reach double digits in 20 of the Wolves’ 37 games.

McDaniels said he’s just “being aggressive and really not thinking. Going and hooping, for real.”

Aggression is the key. McDaniels is indeed hitting a higher percentage of his 3-point attempts over the last month (38%), but whether or not the outside shots fall does not make or break his evening.

Because he’s making his hay near the bucket. Over the last month, 67% of McDaniels’ shot attempts have come from inside the arc, up from 56.7% in the two and a half months prior. He has found spots on the floor from which he can consistently score — in the mid-range near the free-throw line and at the rim — and he’s getting to them at a high frequency.

“I feel like I’m bailing the defense out if I pull up for a three if I know I could get to the mid-range or get to the cup, so just not really bailing out the defense,” McDaniels said. “I know my game. Yeah, I could shoot threes — I’ll shoot some threes, but I know where I’m comfortable at and what I can make like nine times out of 10 — the middie, floaters and stuff.”

That comfort is apparent. It’s led to steadiness on the offensive end.

“It’s one of those things that when you do it, and you prove it to yourself that you can do it, I think there’s kind of a peace and a calmness that comes over you. You don’t have to be so emotional about it, whether the shot goes in or doesn’t go in,” Wolves coach Chris Finch said. “I think he feels like he can get to his offense now, and that gives him great confidence. He’s pretty attack-minded in that way.”

The way McDaniels is playing now reminds Finch of the version of the wing he saw in the first two years of McDaniels’ career. The coach called McDaniels’ recent approach a “course correction.”

“We tell him all the time that he’s a basketball player, he’s not just a shooter. So use all parts of the game,” Finch said. “The last few years, he was probably more catch-and-shoot out of the corners. We see him now driving and connecting with Rudy (Gobert). We see him now driving and kicking a little bit more, as well, which we desperately need that.”

McDaniels’ offensive output is a major boon for the Wolves. Minnesota sports the NBA’s sixth-best offensive rating over the last month, scoring 120.1 points per 100 possessions. That’s a major contrast from the struggles the team exhibited on that end to open the campaign.

As McDaniels’ offense goes, seemingly so, too, do the Wolves.

“Just keeping the confidence in myself,” McDaniels said. “Even if I’m missing — missing 100 shots, just keep shooting and keep attacking.”