Mavs go on 30-0 run in 4th quarter, but fall short
DALLAS — Luka Doncic galloped down a baseline full of frenzied faces, curling back just in time to brush past Mark Daigneault, who’d already nearly paced underneath the rim in hopes of an answer.
A genie, a pause on life like in Adam Sandler’s “Click.” Anything but his final timeout.
While the Mavericks’ historic onslaught unfolded, Daigneault itched for something to change his mind. But Doncic’s layup with 4:10 to play was the last of what he could handle. He’d watched a 30-0 Dallas run — the largest unanswered run in the play-by-play era — diminish his team’s once 24-point lead.
His Thunder squad did the remainder of the game’s talking. It ran up one final 15-3 run to close the game and end up on the right side of league history in a 126-120 win.
“We just had to be present, stay in the moment,” Shai Gilgeous-Alexander said.
Gilgeous-Alexander had seen it all before. The All-Star guard knew Dallas would trap him for much of the game. He knew he’d be forced to find teammates, finishing with nine assists and 17 points. He also knew what to expect from the Mavericks’ late inbound that became an SGA steal and clutch bucket.
“It’s like script, like they just run it. ... You can tell if they’re lackadaisical with it,” SGA said when asked about his fifth steal. “And if they were, I was gonna try to get a steal.”
The play made sense after all that’d unfolded since Daigneault’s timeout. There was a Jalen Williams dunk, part of his team-high 23 points. A couple of right-place-right-time Chet Holmgren putbacks. A series of Holmgren blocks — he finished with 11 points, 11 rebounds and five blocks — to put a muzzle on the Mavs’ earlier momentum.
The game comes with variance. It can be equally romantic and cruel.
OKC could be passionate through a half when it made 13 of its 24 3-pointers and SGA’s teammates helped him fry every trap he saw. The Mavericks shot 29.2% from deep during that stretch.
The Thunder likely kissed its teeth when Seth Curry, Derrick Jones Jr. and Luka Doncic — who lost his mind in a 36-point, 15 rebound and 18 assist performance — pieced together a run the league hadn’t ever seen.
“Is 30-0 a record?” Daigneault asked reporters postgame.
Finding a way back came with a buzz. A blur of emotions and pictures that surely confused both teams. Daigneault could only explain the quarter so well.
“It’s kind of a weird way to win,” he said, “but certainly don’t wanna underestimate the mental toughness of the team.”
Clasping the rebound that sealed the game, Jalen Williams waltzed toward the Thunder bench, barking at his teammates and walking off an avalanche of a fourth quarter. Even behind confusion, he knew what he’d witnessed.
“It’s getting easier for us because we’ve been in these situations so much, just even from last year, that we’re starting to trust each other more in these situations,” Williams said.
Thunder tip-ins
• Davis Bertans is a mad man. His biggest play of the game came toward the end of the third quarter: A 3-pointer that he seemingly was releasing before even squaring his body and planting his feet.
• The 6-foot-10 marksman has made it known that the ball is going up whenever it breezes his way. Somehow that play surpassed any previous expectation of what he was about. He finished with 15 points after drilling two 3-pointers and being fouled on a couple more attempts.
• Wallace proved significant in his homecoming. Inside third quarter lineups that weren’t particularly helpful while SGA was aggressively trapped, Wallace’s efficiency and shotmaking was pivotal. He finished with 15 points and six rebounds in 20 minutes.
• It’s no secret Josh Giddey has had trouble fitting into the puzzle as of late. He still somehow found himself on the floor during a fourth quarter ruled by Minnesota’s monstrous zone earlier in the week. On Saturday, his presence grew thin.
• The third-year guard played just 17 minutes. His last time on the floor? The 8:15 mark of the third quarter. His lack of shooting gravity has put him in tough spots. If Saturday’s game was any indication, he might not be part of Daigneault’s best closing lineup anymore.