On a night when their angry home arena was drunk on boos, Nikola Jokic and his Denver teammates finally gave Nuggets Nation a reason to stand up and cheer.

They ain’t dead yet, folks.

“I have been here before,” Jokic said Monday, “and we know when you play in an elimination game, you need to be extremely focused and locked in.”

For a welcome change, Denver flexed some muscle and took care of business in these NBA playoffs, decisively beating the wounded Timberwolves 125-113.

During pregame introductions, the crowd in Ball Arena booed coach David Adelman, whose protective-as-a-mother-hen support of his underperforming players had rubbed local fans the wrong way like nobody since Nathaniel Hackett was bungling his way through Broncos losses.

From the beautiful people with courtside seats to the regular peeps in the rafters, nearly every spectator in the joint not only intensely watched every move smack-talking Minnesota forward Jaden McDaniels made, but loudly expressed extreme displeasure at every breath the Howlin’ Wolf took on the court.

“I love this environment. Everyone hating me, all the hate is coming towards me. I love it. I don’t care I feed into it,” McDaniels said.

But all those frowns in the joint got turned upside down.

This was the blowout the Nuggets desperately needed to restore the faith of their hometown and confidence in themselves.

Game 5 of this best-of-seven series began with Denver on the brink of elimination. It ended with Nuggets starters relaxing on the bench.

And wasn’t that the bench revenge on McDaniels, who had run his mouth and nearly run Denver into the ground during three straight victories?

Late in the third quarter, guard Christian Braun put a little hot sauce on a dunk that gave the Nuggets a commanding 90-69 lead, by hanging on the rim over McDaniels and pointing a snarky finger at the new persona non grata in Nuggets Nation.

That little bit of redemption had been a long time coming.

Earlier in this series, McDaniels had gotten under the Nuggets’ skin by saying all of them were “bad defenders” and caused Jokic to blow his stack by punctuating a big victory by the Timberwolves in Game 4 by rubbing it in Denver’s faces with a totally unnecessary layup a second before the final horn.

But now? The Howlin’ Wolf doesn’t have the talent on his side to back up his fighting words.

McDaniels, who finished this defeat with a meaningless 13 points, is now without All-NBA guard Anthony Edwards, as well as heart-and-soul teammate Donte DiVincenzo, both shelved with serious injuries.

That’s why, despite facing a win-or-go-home game in Minneapolis on Thursday night, the fickle finger of fate has turned in the Nuggets’ favor.

After threatening to go back to Serbia for the summer to ruminate on the worst postseason performance of his brilliant career, Joker changed the narrative in a major way with a 27/12/16 triple-double that made NBA history. Combine the playoffs and regular season, and nobody has produced more triple-double excellence than Denver’s three-time MVP.

No surprise there. The real feel-good story of Game 5 was Spencer Jones, a young role player who stepped in for an injured teammate and gave a flawless impression of Aaron Gordon. Jones not only gave Denver a much-needed 20 points, but a physical presence on defense.

In NBA history, the record of teams trailing a best-of-seven series 3-1 has been a daunting 13-285.

Daunting odds.

But anyone who recalls the playoffs in the bubble from the year of the COVID-19 pandemic knows the Nuggets’ attitude:

Don’t tell them the odds.

“We’re going to win the next one,” McDaniels said.

Unlike McDaniels, the Nuggets will let the scoreboard do their talking.