Doncic & Co. do as they please
DALLAS — The Mavericks needed no late-game drama. Luka Doncic did not need a last-minute 3pointer, as he did in Houston last week. He did not pull a last-second miracle, as he did two nights ago to beat New York.
The Mavericks scored far too easily for that. The Rockets, powerless to stop or even reliably slow the Mavericks, could not keep up with all the Doncicfueled scoring the Mavericks threw at them, with the only question seeming to be when the teams would decide it was time to clear the benches.
The Mavericks led by as much as 25 before the benches took over, Dallas’ 129-114 win long-since secured.
There never seemed any doubt, with much more than Doncic piling up numbers as players around him could not in the previous meeting with the Rockets and looking far better with him than without when he sat out the Rockets’ win in Dallas last month.
Doncic led the Mavericks with 35 points, 13 assists and 12 rebounds. He had his eighth triple-double of the season, before the third quarter was over.
Of the seven 30-point triple-doubles through three quarters in the NBA since 1997-98, he has five of them.
Old friend Christian Wood added 21 points, with Dwight Powell coming off the bench to make all eight of his shots, scoring 19.
Jalen Green had 23 points on 7-of-15 shooting, 4-of-7 from deep. He has scored 20 points in five consecutive games, one shy of his longest streak of the season and has made three 3-pointers in four of five games after getting as many as three 3s just once in 11 games.
Kevin Porter Jr. added 17 points and seven assists. But the Rockets had just two other players in double figures, Alperen Sengun and Jabari Smith Jr., and they combined for just two second-half points.
Run. Run fast
The Rockets give up more fast-break points than any team in the NBA, 17.6 per game, but that is largely because they commit more turnovers than any team in the NBA.
That was not the problem on Thursday.
The Rockets turned the ball over at almost their usual rate. But more than cashing in on all the head starts, the Mavericks looked to run off missed shots, getting the ball to Doncic and then sprinting the other way. Powell especially left the Rockets in his dust. But he was not the only one.
Through three quarters, the Mavericks had outscored the Rockets, 25-0, in fast-break points, coming within three of the most the Rockets have allowed in a game with 12 minutes still to play.
This is nothing new. In the previous two games, the Rockets allowed 24 fast-break points in Boston, 23 in Chicago. This was worse.
The Rockets gave up all those fast-break points to the team that averages fewer on the break than any in the NBA.
Remember me?
Wood, the former Rocket, had struggled to get going and was forced to spend his night defending pick-and-roll after pickand-roll, with the Rockets seemingly determined to keep him busy on that end.
But once he got going in the third quarter, he rode that wave to score 12 points in seven minutes, capped by a 3-pointer he seemed to especially enjoy, turning and staring down the Rockets bench after it went in.
Minutes later, he picked up his fifth foul in 16½ minutes and sat with 15 points and a season-high five blocked shots. By then, the Mavericks had led by 21 and he seemed to have made a point.
Bari back, but …
Smith had scored more than 14 points in one of his previous six games, the career-high 24 he put up against the Mavs last week.
He especially struggled against the Celtics on Tuesday, making two of 10 shots. In the two games since that night against the Mavericks, he had made three of 13 3-pointers and including that game against Dallas, had made eight of 33 3s in his previous six games.
The Mavericks might have trouble believing he ever struggled.
Smith had 14 points in the first quarter when he made six of seven shots, though the shot he missed was his 3-point attempt. He seemed so sure of himself that when Sengun was out of the game and the Mavericks went to a zone, the Rockets got the ball to Smith in the middle of the Dallas defense in the role Sengun normally fills.
He did not keep that going, largely because he continued to miss 3s, going 1of-3 in the second quarter with two more missed shots from deep.
That was the problem. He missed his four 3-point attempts and after that 14point first quarter, he was scoreless in the second half.
Locked up from deep
Teams do not make many 3s against the Mavericks, mostly because teams don’t get to take them.
Only three teams allow fewer 3-pointers or 3-point attempts than the Mavericks, with the Rockets among those unable to get good looks against the Dallas defense.
The Rockets went just 8of-26 on 3-pointers against the Mavericks last week and attempted a seasonlow 22 3s against the Mavericks in Dallas last month.
In the first half Thursday, the Rockets were just 4-of-15 on 3s, going 18 minutes between made 3pointers and from a fourpoint deficit to trailing by 13 from one made 3-pointer to another.
If it was not already obvious, the Rockets usually need 3s to fall.
In Chicago on Monday, they made 38.6 percent in the win. They are making 38.2 percent in wins.
In Boston a night later, they made 31.1 percent in the loss. They are making 31 percent in losses.
Other than Porter and Green, no Rockets player hit a 3 until Usman Garuba got one to fall with 1:26 left in the third quarter.