NBA
Doncic: “Who cares, we lost, man”
After Tuesday’s 117-95 defeat in Oklahoma, the Mavs guard confessed that the team has as habit of being slow starters but cannot afford to relax against an offensive rival.
Dallas’s poor record in opening playoff games continued on Tuesday as the team crashed to a 117-95 defeat to the Oklahoma Thunder at the Paycom Center. It took the Mavs’ Game 1 record under Jason Kidd to 0-5 - an alarming stat, which Luka Doncic was first to admit in his postgame analysis with the press. Doncic and Kyrie Irving ended with the best figures for Kidd’s team although the Slovenian has been struggling with a knee sprain injury since the last round.
Dallas pulled to within one point of the Thunder in the third quarter but overall were down in nearly all the stats, apart from three-point percentage and offensive rebounds. Doncic, who finished with 19 points, seven rebounds and 13 assists but with just 1-of-8 from beyond the perimeter line, reflected afterwards: “I think just we need to be better, to the whole game. That third quarter, we got to one and then we just relaxed a little bit so we’ve just to have the effort for the eight minutes.
Doncic praise for OKC
He continued, “Who cares, we lost, man. We’ve just gotta move on to the next one. I gotta be better, we’ve gotta be better. We’ve gotta focus. We’re known for Game 1 struggling. They’re a great team, a great defensive team, a great offensive team so it’s not going to be easy at all. We’ve gotta play very good basketball and focus better for eight minutes”. When asked in which particular area the team needs to be better, he retorted bluntly, “Effort. Making shots”.
OKC coach Mark Daigneault employed a strategy of trapping and narrow defense to force Doncic behind the arc - a tactic which worked to perfection on the night. The Mavs host the Thunder in Game 2 on Saturday and Luka is confident that his team can tie the series. “At the end of the day, one of the teams has got to get to the four wins, right? Obviously, we’d like to have Game 1 but we’ve just gotta watch film and move onto the next one. There’s a new game in two days so we’ve got another chance to win,” he offered.
“We just gotta start falling in,” he continued. “Especially in that first half, they shot 23 free-throws. We’ve got to get our hands out and stop falling. That gets guys in their rhythm and it’s hard to stop them. I think both D Live and Gaff have a lot of reservation. We talked about playing off two legs and just and dunk it you know, Chet [Holmgren]’s gonna be up there, they both need to go and dunk that”.