Nice to see the opinions of former players of some consequence

https://www.nba.com/news/power-rankings-2023-24-week-23

#7 DALLAS MAVERICKS

The Mavs have won seven of their last eight games, with the only loss having come without Luka Doncic, by single digits, and in Oklahoma City. They seem to be in a three-team race for the final guaranteed playoff spot in the Western Conference, tied in the loss column with both the sixth-place Suns and seventh-place Kings.

Three takeaways

• The Mavs rank third defensively (107.7 points allowed per 100 possessions) over this 7-1 stretch, though they’re still a couple of good defensive games from climbing out of the bottom 10 on that end of the floor for the season. The eight games have been pretty balanced regarding the strength of the opposing offenses.
  
• Better defense can lead to more transition opportunities, and the Mavs had two great transition sequences in their win over the Jazz on Thursday, one resulting in a lob for Derrick Jones Jr. and the other finishing with a lob for Kyrie Irving, the guy who’s given their transition game a big boost. The Mavs have seen the league’s second-biggest jump in both pace and transition points per game, and they’ve averaged 16.4 fast break points per 48 minutes with Irving on the floor, compared to just 14.8 per 48 with him off the floor.
  
• More transition (along with a couple of bouncy bigs) leads to more layups and dunks. And over their last seven games, the Mavs have outscored their opponents by an average of 16.3 points in the restricted area. They’ve still been outscored by 1.7 per game (18th) for the season, but that’s a big improvement from last season (-5.6, 28th).
  

Start of an important 5 game road trip. This trip could secure us a spot OUT of the play-in or seal our fate. 

Go Mavs!

Who exceed expectations in the win tonight?

Lets go Mavs!

Who played above expectations?

Wemby on quite a role lately.  The first quarter against Dallas was pretty eye opening by Wemby in the last meeting.   Pretty scary.  Mavs pulled away and the Spurs limited Wemby minutes.  Worried what a 38 minute Wemby game could mean.   Just feel this may be a tough game.

over/under on 1 Maxi/PJ made three?   We really need them to get going shooting.

Who elevated his game to win this one for the Mavericks?