The Mavericks need to play better
The Dallas Mavericks lost 108-102 to the Houston Rockets Thursday night in Dallas. Luka Doncic led the Mavericks with 29 points while Jalen Green led the Mavericks with 23. The Mavericks once again came out and scuffled their way to a large deficit.
The Mavericks were frustrated and had a variety of foul trouble resulting in Dwight Powell even getting a few minutes in an attempt to find an answer. Powell helped a little, but the Mavericks just did not do enough to win this game.
The Mavericks finally made a run with some hot shooting from Klay Thompson and Doncic, but it proved to be too little too late to make up for the earlier struggles. Jalen Green made a back-breaking contested three late which cancelled out a couple of similar shots from Doncic.
Here are the things to know.
Luka Doncic has to play better
Doncic is an all-time great player already. He has been good enough that it would be a great start to the season for most players. His stats even look OK. He has not played as well as he is capable of playing. He has been better defensively, and in the long-term view, his offense is the lowest level of concern possible. Right now, that offense is a problem that has cost the team.
The Mavericks have to fight more on the boards
The Mavericks were outrebounded 50-37. The Rockets had 18 offensive rebounds. Teams that have the aspirations the Mavericks do, simply don’t get outrebounded like that. The Mavericks’ centers both attack drives as they should. That is the center piece of the Mavericks’ defense. When they are forced to help, the rest of the team has to come together as a team and box out. So far, that hasn’t happened.
PJ Washington continues to do everything but shoot
Washington looks like an NBA 2K player who has chosen to sacrifice slider points from his shooting in order to improve his defense. He had three steals and blocks today. He also had nine rebounds.
He was 0-of-2 on threes, which knocks him down to 6-of-24 for the season. He has too long of a track record of shooting to give up on his shot, but this is concerning because everything else he does means the Mavericks certainly cannot take him off the floor.
Overall, this was a bad loss. It is too early to get overly upset, but losses like this count just as much as losses in May when they tally up the standings at the end of the year.
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