The Wolves returned to New Orleans tonight five weeks after Al Jefferson’s season ended on that same floor when he came up hopping and clutching his right knee late in that loss to the Hornets.

The Wolves, of course, played without Jefferson. The Hornets played without Tyson Chandler and Peja Stojakovic.

All they really need, at the end anyway, was Chris Paul and David West.

Those two showed what a couple of All Stars can do when the game is on the line: They combined to score the Hornets’ final 14 points.

Included was the eventual winning basket when the Wolves stuck bigger Rodney Carney on Paul and CP3 dribbled and dribbled and dribbled — and probed and probed — until he found West cutting free for the go-ahead slam dunk with 12.6 seconds left.

“That’s what he does,” Kevin McHale said. “He does it a lot.”

The Wolves had the ball last, and got a good shot: Randy Foye worked a pick-and-roll with Ryan Gomes and got him a short, open shot from the right side that went in and came back out just before the final buzzer sounded.

Foye said he was certain it was in, more certain that three-pointer he fired up just before at the buzzer in Portland a couple weeks ago and that hit the back of the rim and came bounding out.

The Wolves got themselves back in the game with a 19-9 fourth quarter run that put them up by four points with less than three minutes left. They fell behind by 12 points early after missing nine of their first 10 shots.

Kevin Love for the second straight night followed a very quiet first half with a robust second half: He had eight of 11 rebounds and 16 of his 23 points (one shy of a career high) after halftime, much like he did Tuesday in San Antonio. That 23-11 was his 22nd double double of the season, his second in as many nights and his fourth in the last six games.

The Wolves flew to Houston after tonight’s game, will practice at the Rockets’ Toyota Center practice facility today and then end this three-game trip — the first such one in back-to-back weeks — Friday night against the Rockets.

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