The Mavericks continue to put forth the effort, oftentimes playing well enough to win, but ultimately commit too many team errors to get over the hump. Tonight they lost 123-114 in a game they fought their way back into, and outscored Phoenix 33-28 in the fourth (a margin that narrowed due to some end-of-game free throws.)
Improvements are happening, and Moussa Cisse continues to be a big surprise contributor early in the season, but until the wins follow the effort, there’s going to be some grumbling.
At least the players can’t get mad about the chants anymore! Until and unless the losses continue to pile up. Then we may start to hear “sell the team” replace the “fire Nico” ones.
15: points off turnover differential
In a game that Dallas dropped by just 9 points after mounting a furious fourth quarter comeback that fell just short, Dallas was outscored by 15 on points off turnovers.
It’s such a clear crystallization of what ails this team right now. On a night when they actually shot the ball fairly well as a team, 36% from three and over 50% from the floor, better than Phoenix’s 46.3% shooting night, Dallas coughed the ball up 19 times and gave up 31 points off those turnovers.
Dallas is desperately in need of a true offensive facilitator. Kidd has made it clear he’s no fan of D’Angelo Russell, the guard brought in to spell the team while awaiting the return of Kyrie Irving, as Russell continues to come off the bench and played just 14 minutes tonight. Brandon Williams, the guard Kidd has relied on to start games, plays well enough, but his four turnovers combined with a matching four from Cooper Flagg are not what you want to see from the players you’re leaning on to be the lead ball handlers.
10 Blocks, a season high
Dallas’ defense, despite missing a ton of talent and size on that side of the ball, remains active and engaged. They set a new season high with 9 blocks. Moussa Cissé, the rookie on a two-way contract who has made the most of his opportunity while Dallas is without Anthony Davis and Dereck Lively, led the way with four. Cooper Flagg and Daniel Gafford contributed two apiece as well.
Cissé is making quite the impression as a guy who was battling to earn the second two-way. His ability to give Dallas solid minutes at the five certainly is going to give the front office some additional flexibility when it comes to shaping this post-Nico roster. While it’s nice to have size, four playable centers seem like overkill.
Still, Dallas’ dream of filling the floor with nothing but forwards and centers is certainly leading to dividends on the defensive end, and they were even able to keep the points in the paint numbers dead even, with both teams scoring 52 in the paint, and won the rebounding battle 55 to 52.
9: Klay’s 4th quarter scoring
The Mavericks trailed by as many as 16 in the fourth, but managed to whittle that Phoenix lead down to just 3 with 1:48 to play, and Klay Thompson was Dallas’ leading scorer in the frame with 9 points on 3-of-5 shooting. It gave the Mavs a puncher’s chance in the game, but, alas, six fourth-quarter turnovers were too much to overcome.
Klay’s three hits in the fourth made up half of his three-point makes tonight, where he went 6-of-16 from deep and led Dallas’ bench scoring with 19 points. It anchored what was probably Dallas’ best three-point shooting night as a team so far this season. Flagg’s 3-of-7 night was nice to see as well. The long ball hasn’t quite started to fall consistently for him yet this year, so maybe that’s starting to turn around.
