The Dallas Mavericks (5-13) lost what might go down as the ugliest NBA basketball game of the year on Saturday, 102-96, to the Memphis Grizzlies (6-11) at American Airlines Center. Crimes against the game were
perpetrated as two bad teams tried their best to get out of the other’s way.
Dallas shot just 35-0f-91 (38.5%) from the field in the unsightly loss. Cooper Flagg and P.J. Washington combined to hit just 11-of-32 from the field the night after they combined for 53 points in the Mavericks’ 118-115 win over the New Orleans Pelicans.
Santi Aldama led the Grizzlies with 20 points and eight rebounds in the win. Washington left the game in the fourth quarter with an apparent back injury as Dallas wilted down the stretch.
Read at your own peril, Mavs fans. Here are four stats that stood out in the Mavericks’ latest chapter in a season of sadness.
4-of-5: First-quarter 3-point shooting from Brandon Williams and Klay Thompson
Don’t look now, Mavs fans, but this team is creeping closer and closer to the middle of the NBA pack in 3-point shooting over the last eight games. After donning the cement shoes and jumping into the 3-point lake to start the year, to the tune of a league-worst 29.5% shooting clip through the season’s first 11 games, Dallas has turned a corner from distance of late. That’s right, folks, your Mavericks have been downright average from 3-point land lately. Their 35.9% shooting clip from distance over the last eight games (97-of-270), which would put the Mavs right in the meaty middle of the NBA 3-point curve if it held over the course of the season, has truly been a sight to behold.
Brandon Williams sank both his first two looks from 3-point range early in Saturday’s game, then Klay Thompson chimed in with two more before the first quarter was out, to continue that trend against the Grizzlies. The pair combined to hit four of their five first-quarter 3-point attempts, a welcome sight after Dallas had been unable to hit the broad side of a barn earlier this year.
Williams, playing on his 25th birthday, led all scorers with 10 points in the first quarter, as the Mavs took a 22-21 lead after one. It’s still not beautiful team basketball, but hey — we’ll take any pleasantly surprising signs of life from this team we can get at this point.
Thompson missed his third attempt before canning two more longballs early in the second quarter. His fourth of the game came with 8:21 left in the first half and put the Mavericks up 32-27.
1-of-6: Cooper Flagg first-half shooting
While Williams and Thompson shot 6-for-8 from 3-point land in the first half, the rest of the Mavericks’ offense was at a predictable standstill. It’s not that Cooper Flagg’s 1-of-6 field goal shooting in the half was the cause of the stagnation — it was more of a symptom of it. Coming off his career-high scoring night (29 points) on Friday, the Mavericks seemed to forget about Flagg for long stretches on the second night of the back-to-back set against the Grizzlies.
When the ball moves through Flagg, good things happen for this team. He’s a playmaker on a team otherwise devoid of dependable playmakers. How do you expect the young man to find a rhythm if the ball doesn’t find him for three, four or five minutes at a time? Let the kid set a screen or two and see what comes of it, maybe?
P.J. Washington, who added 24 points and nine rebounds in Friday’s win, got off to a sluggish start as well on Saturday. Washington made just one of his first eight field goal attempts before erupting for eight points in a two-minute stretch late in the second quarter and missed all four of his 3-point attempts in the first half.
Finally, the Mavs were able to limit the turnovers to six in Saturday’s first half. Finally, they outshot someone from 3-point range as a team. But even still, the first half devolved into a rock fight as both the Mavericks and the Grizzlies struggled to complete possessions with made buckets. As ugly as it looked at times, Dallas held a 47-43 lead at the break with a real chance to win back-to-back games for the first time this year staring the Mavs in the face.
Flagg didn’t fare much better in the second half, either, ending the night with 12 points and seven rebounds on 4-of-15 shooting.
23-11: Memphis’ advantage on the offensive glass
Memphis controlled the third quarter as the wheels fell off for the Mavericks on offense out of halftime. Dallas shot just 9-of-25 (36%) from the field in the third, which ground to a near halt during Caleb Martin’s five minutes on the floor. Just a rugged, rugged watch on the second night of the back-to-back set.
Memphis wasn’t much better, but the difference was on the offensive glass. The Grizzlies outscored the Mavericks 23-7 on second-chance points through three quarters by beating them up on the offensive glass, 20-8.
Both teams were thin in the frontcourt, as Zach Edey and Santi Aldama were the only two bigs available for Memphis once Jock Landale went out with an injury toward the end of the first half. The Mavs, of course, were without both Anthony Davis (calf) and Dereck Lively II (knee/rest). In an otherwise borderline unwatchable game, Memphis at least brought a little energy underneath when shots went up, resulting in just enough extra possessions to maintain a slim 76-73 lead going into the fourth quarter. Thompson’s last-second turaround 3-pointer in the right corner as time expired made it a one-possession affair at the end of three.
The Grizzlies ended the night with a 23-11 advantage on the offensive glass and outscored Dallas 29-12 in second-chance points in the win.
22: Thompson’s season-high scoring night
After knocking down that last-second turnaround 3-ball at the third-quarter buzzer, Thompson knocked down his sixth of the night, this time from the left corner, with 3:22 left in the game to tie the game, 92-92. That shot game Thompson a new season-high scoring mark of 19 points behind his 6-of-12 effort from 3-point land.
The rest of the Dallas Mavericks combined to shoot just 7-of-24 from distance to that point. Thompson’s big night from beyond the arc just wasn’t enough to lift the team out of the offensive funk, and with 20 seconds to play, the Mavs’ offense broke down one last time off a frantic inbound play, leaving Thompson with the ball in his hands at the logo with just two seconds left on the shot clock.
The very long shot came up very short, a fitting end to a frustrating night among frustrating nights. Dallas limped into the locker room with a brutal 102-96 loss.
