The Dallas Mavericks beat the Cleveland Cavaliers 130-120 Sunday afternoon in Cleveland. It was a stunning result for the lottery-bound Mavericks, especially after the Cavaliers thumped the Mavericks by 33 points Friday night in Dallas.
Cooper Flagg put together another excellent game with 27 points and 10 assists, while Donovan Mitchell led the Cavs with 26 points.
Dallas started this game strong and really enforced their will on the game all the way through. The Mavericks led 35-31 after the first
quarter and only had a few wobbly moments in the second quarter before running away with things in the second half. These afternoon games are always unpredictable and weird, and the Cavs had no interest in playing this game until it was too late. Dallas played significantly harder than the Cavs and were rewarded for it with a fun win.
Dallas entered this game having lost 19 of their previous 22. The last time Dallas beat a team with a winning record was all the way back on Jan. 22 when they beat the Warriors in Dallas. This was a truly embarrassing game for the Cavaliers and a nice, foundation-building win for the Mavericks.
Let’s get on to what we notcied.
Cooper Flagg looks like Cooper Flagg again
Flagg had a rough go in his first few games returning from his foot injury, but the Flagg we saw before that injury is starting to emerge. Flagg had 27 points, 10 assists, six rebounds, and two blocks against the Cavs, easily the best player on the floor for either team.
It’s Flagg’s 10th game with at least 25 points and 10 assists, and according to the Mavericks television broadcast, the rest of the rookie class has combined for nine such games. Dallas started Ryan Nembhard at point, and once again that proved to be a boon for Flagg. He wasn’t forced to be the alpha and omega of every possession and being able to catch off-ball really helps his drive-and-attack game.
The passing is the real story, and Flagg is just seeing the floor so well right now. He’s making reads he wasn’t early in the season, and while he’s not the ball-dominate, heliocentric archetype that most number one options are in today’s NBA, he’s showing more than enough playmaking chops to get Mavericks fans excited for the future.
Experimental lineups are fun!
Something I’ve groaned about in the last month or so is that if the Mavericks are going to be a bad team and lose a lot of games, they can at least try some new things. Unfortunately “Cooper Flagg at point guard” appeared to be the extent of Jason Kidd’s tinkering, and that just wasn’t going to cut it.
Today Kidd got weird: PJ Washington started at center and the Mavericks played practically the whole game without a true big on the floor, depending on how you qualify Marvin Bagley. Bagley and Dwight Powell were the only bigs to play in this game and Bagley only had 16 minutes while Powell had two. For the majority of the game Dallas played super small-ball and that’s fun. It’s different. It’s new. This is the time to try out funky stuff and see how your team reacts.
Combined with Nembhard starting at point guard, the small ball worked. Dallas had a great shooting night and it’s probably no surprise they were able to play fast and loose with Washington at center. Dallas had lots of slashing and perhaps the best spacing I’ve seen all season. There is no way Washington at center can be a full-time commitment, but it’s a fun party trick and something Kidd could lean on in certain situations going forward in future seasons.
Playing hard matters
It’s pretty ridiculous that the regular season of the best professional basketball league on the planet can be distilled down to “who played harder” but that’s the NBA in 2026. It shouldn’t be this way, and “playing hard” shouldn’t feel like such an outlier in a league where the players are the best in the world and compensated like it, but that’s how it is. Dallas played harder than Cleveland, and that’s sorta where this game ultimately starts and finishes.
Dallas was the first to the floor for almost every loose ball. The team attacked with force, while the Cavs sorta just slept-walked through the game until trying to frantically rally when they realized an embarrassing loss was coming. The Mavericks had no business winning this game on the road, there a billion things we can credit the Mavericks for, but the first one has to be that they just gave a shit about this game more than their opponent.
Mavericks fans can be pissed off about what this means for the team’s lottery odds, but these foundational, culture setting moments are important.
