Luka Doncic learns extremely critical lesson in overtime win against Brooklyn
During the game’s overtime quarter, things looked a little bit different for the Dallas Mavericks. For the first time all season, Dallas won a close game, 129-125, over the Brooklyn Nets in Barclays Center in Brooklyn, bringing Dallas’ record to 2-2 and providing some level of confidence that the Mavericks can – in fact — […]
During the game’s overtime quarter, things looked a little bit different for the Dallas Mavericks.
For the first time all season, Dallas won a close game, 129-125, over the Brooklyn Nets in Barclays Center in Brooklyn, bringing Dallas’ record to 2-2 and providing some level of confidence that the Mavericks can – in fact — win close games.
What made Thursday night feel different was simple, when crunch time hit, Luka Doncic didn’t try and do it all himself. He trusted his teammates. This is something, in Dallas’ two losses on the season, that can’t always be said.
“His maturity and IQ are so high, he understands the moment,” Mavericks head coach Jason Kidd said of Doncic’s late-game execution. “He delivered.”
At the end of regulation against Brooklyn, Doncic drove to the basket, drawing three defenders before somehow whipping a pass out to Reggie Bullock, who had a decent look from the corner to win the game. Bullock missed. And Dallas and Brooklyn went to overtime.
In overtime, Doncic again trusted his teammates.
Following a made Doncic pull-up jumper, he then found Tim Hardaway Jr. on a pick-and-pop 3-pointer. Less than a minute later, Doncic hit Maxi Kleber for another 3-pointer. And 30 seconds later, Doncic swung a pass to Bullock, who drilled the third straight 3-pointer of the overtime quarter, sending the Nets into a deficit they never recovered from in the final three minutes of the game.
The offense was a far cry from Dallas’ previously close bouts with New Orleans and Phoenix.
“The gates opened by being able to knock down threes,” Kidd said. “It’s not easy to win in this league. We’ve had some close games that we’ve been on the other side. We are starting to learn what we need to do.”
Dallas won because in overtime Kidd and everyone else on the floor didn’t assume Doncic was going to save them with unlikely heroics. For the first time all year, Dallas’ shooters made their own magic happen.
Against Phoenix, Doncic took a needlessly difficult shot to win the game near halfcourt. When battling New Orleans, he got a step-back look, but he couldn’t put enough lift on the ball to put it in the basket. So, in the third close game in nearly as many, Doncic didn’t leave it up to chance, or a step back, or making the impossible feel real. He simply made the right basketball play and left everything else up to Dallas’ shooters.
It finally paid off.
“I just enjoy the game,” Doncic, who scored 41 points, said on Thursday. “Sometimes it’s going to work, sometimes not. For now, it was a good decision. But if I would have lost it, it wasn’t going to be a good decision.”
Doncic added when asked about if he wants to always make the right basketball decision: “Yeah, not always I do it. But yeah, that is always the key.”
Doncic feels like he’s been around forever. His game comes off that way. Yet, the first two close losses of the season reminded everyone that, despite Doncic’s ahead-of-schedule greatness, he is still learning how to win consistently in the NBA.
Part of that learning process boils down to making end-of-game situations simpler. Why take a step back when a pick-and-pop 3-pointer will suffice? Or maybe three.
Thursday was a valuable lesson for Doncic and Dallas. Far too often the Mavericks have turned to Doncic to pull victory from the jaws of defeat, often by prayer or what some coin as “Luka Magic.” It’s fun, but it’s not sustainable. Beating Brooklyn in the way Dallas did shows how this team can sustainably win close games.
Through trust in each other.
And that starts from Doncic and trickles down.
Related Dallas Mavericks reading
"The cruel reality facing the Dallas Mavericks early in the season."
"How Christian Wood's debut felt like a Hollywood movie."
"How the Dallas Mavericks may have walked into the next Patrick Beverley."
Feature image via Brad Penner-USA TODAY Sports
