When the Mavericks needed him most, the Dallas star was sitting on the bench after fouling out in Game 3.
Head coach Joe Mazzulla is a long-time practitioner of jiu-jitsu, a close combat fighting style that can look more like wrestling than other martial arts. It’s a slow burn, with combatants leverage their weight on pressure points until their opponent submits.
Those principles seem to be in play during these NBA Finals.
On Wednesday night, the Celtics took a 3-0 stranglehold on the series after a 106-99 win in Dallas. And while it was ultimately a 33-11 knockout punch of a run that spanned the third and fourth quarter that knocked out the Mavericks, the grip of that suffocation was tightening throughout the entire game, if not the entire series.
After Game 1, I wrote about how Boston is forcing Doncic to play both sides of the ball. On defense, they’re taking away his creativity as a playmaker and making him a one-on-one scorer. As gifted a scorer as he is, it’s possible that Dallas is generating more points with Luke in isolation than if he were spraying the ball all around the floor. However, he’s also expending more energy and that’s the long game. That’s the chokehold.
On offense, the Celtics are simply putting him into every action, forcing Dallas’ worst defender to, well, defend.
“He definitely has a bull’s eye on his chest,” Jason Kidd said. “He’s gotta be able to guard and understand that we’re there to protect him and help him if he does get beat. Again, he’s carried the load offensively and they are putting him in every pick-and-roll and iso. He’s gotta be able to play the game where he can rest on offense and let others carry the load.”
That load became too heavy to carry in Game 3. With a straight face, Joe Mazzulla said that he didn’t think Doncic gets worn down and that “he looks pretty fresh out there,” but the eye test and the numbers say differently.
With 4:12 left in the game and Dallas in the middle of a massive comeback, Doncic lazily jumped into the driving lane of Jaylen Brown in transition and drew his sixth foul. Two possessions earlier, he got tied up with Brown in the post to get his fifth. He barked at the bench to challenge the call, but his fate was already sealed.
“It’s OK. Every time they drove it, they basically call a foul,” Doncic said after fouling out in just his third game ever. “I’ll try to be better. Gotta get better.”
His absence in the clutch played a part in Dallas’ demise, but it’s not as if he’s come up big late in these Finals games. Through three fourth quarters so far, Doncic has scored just eight points. Kyrie Irving has just thirteen, scoring nine of them in Game 3. Those are closers not closing. Here’s their scoring throughout the last twelve quarters:
Doncic has been incredible in first halves, averaging 19 points in the first two quarters, but those numbers are nearly cut in half in the third and fourth (10.7). Brown’s scoring average has gone up from 9 to 15.3 after halftime, including 24 in the second half of Game 3.
The referendum Thursday morning will be on Doncic’s defense. It’s already started. ESPN’s Brian Windhorst and The Volume’s Jason Timpf have already gone in on him. Doncic could be better. No doubt, but it discredits the Celtics of putting in a game plan to wear him down. Imagine having to go up against Jrue Holiday and Derrick White and Sam Hauser and Payton Pritchard and Jayson Tatum and Jaylen Brown.
As White put it, “the strength of the team is the team.”
“Luka is a great player. He does a lot for their team. Offensively, he has the ball in his hands a lot,” Brown said of his counterpart. “It’s a tough lift for him. He’s been tough, even with that fourth quarter, those stats, he’s still able to pretty much able get to whatever he wants.”
Boston will compliment Doncic through the rest of the series and deservedly so. He’s leading the Finals in scoring and is second in assists. He deserves those flowers. But with only a day rest between Games 3 and 4, those accolades could be ending soon, those flowers will die, and Doncic will have the entire summer to rest up for next season.
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