(06-06-2021, 08:37 PM)DallasBasketball Wrote: If the Mavs had somehow pulled off the Clippers upset, which I think they were basically a hot shooting game away from doing.. if they had, who knows what the ceiling of this team would have been?
I feel like what I saw in this playoff series against the Clippers was some of the most amazing shooting I’ve witnessed since the Dirk era Mavs. I don’t know if it can just be said that no one plays defense anymore, but when you see stats like 13-17, 8-10, 3/3 from 3.. in the first half! It’s mind-blowing that these players can shoot so consistently. For both teams!
In the Dirk days I don’t think we ever faced another superstar as superior as Kawhi is right now sans 06 D Wade, who had the refs help, and maybe so did the Clippers in game 6, but that’s not really the point of this. The point is the story of the nba right now is skilled players, and we are holding our own because we got a pretty darn good group to go with Luka.
But Luka means we’ve got to get better fast. Because Luka can compete for championships right now. And since those 2001-2011 days, we’ve seen what cap hello looks like. And since 2012+ we’ve seen what dry powder looks like. And we had Luka on a rookie deal for 3 off seasons and got to go hard at one all-star who made a mistake not to join Luka(Walker 2 Boston). And now we are at the crossroads of another plan powder or cap hello plan. I can’t say I know what we should do, but I don’t think we should quit on what we have because I think it is something to build on.
No matter what the Clippers do from here I think its clear Dallas Mavericks had to play over their head to compete as well as they did and give the "other" LA super team all they could handle.
That Clipper team that won the games over the Mavs they did, played all the way up to their expected level.
Utah is also hella good team now though so that should be interesting ... Its not as though Dallas would have favored against Utah, they most decidedly would NOT.
Kawhi went crazy whenever they had to have plays or a bucket. He applied defensive clamps as much as humanly possible everyone from Luka to Boban! Amazing performance by Kawhi.
Paul George played like a legit #2 star should and then depth of the Clippers was clearly more consistent than the Mavs whose bench played hard, but were not as good overall.
Kudos to Mavs on a season well fought. Now about KP ...
I'll put the defense aside for a moment because I think he did hustle and really tried in the series but I also think he has a reserve now to protect his body that he didn't have in the Unicorn days.
Unicorn KP not only had a higher usage but he also had a reckless abandon going inside and in the painted area which he may think his body can't hold up to.
In terms of his usage next to Luka and in Carlisle's system I actually think its simpler than it might appear.
KP has to get his shot back. His shooting % have to be at Allstar levels, from the 3 all the way in.
He's too tall for anyone to actually bother his shot most of the time, so it's mostly up to him whether he can drain them or not.
0-5 in Game 7 from the 3. THJ an unusual 1 for 9 and those 2 shooting well is enough to change the entire game and the series or not. I guess that's your #2 and #3 in some order next to Luka esp. since Brunson mostly sat the bench in the big playoff games.
That's it folks. Luka is #1, who is your #2 and #3. They have to take the next step if it's these TWO.