Why the Mavericks Are the Biggest Dark Horse in the NBA

Since the All-Star break, the Dallas Mavericks have the third-best record in the NBA and the fourth-best net rating during that span. Luca Donic is playing at an MVP level and the synergy between him and Kyrie Irving has never been better, possibly most importantly the fact that their defense has improved drastically since the start of the season, going from the 19th ranked defense before the All-Star break defense ranked 10th since the All-Star break, so the question is whether this team has what it takes to win. the Western Conference and potentially even win it all, we already know that Luca Don is good enough to take you far in the postseason, as we saw in the 2022 playoffs, where the Mavericks managed to reach the Western Conference Finals, which obviously It was too much. different team, but in many ways it's hard to say that this current version of the Dallas Mavericks isn't significantly better than that version of the Dallas Mavericks.

Dallas currently has an offensive rating that scores three and a half points per 100 possessions more than the league average on the 2022 Dallas Mavericks team that reached the Western Conference Finals, just 1.8 points per 100 possessions per above the league average in offensive efficiency, however, one major difference is that that Dallas team was actually pretty good defensively. Dallas had the eighth-best defense that year. have a defensive rating that was two points per 100 possessions better than the League average and this year overall they are pretty much around the League average in terms of defensive rating, but if you look at their defensive rating since the break All-Star Game, I have been the tenth best defense with 1.3 points per 100 possessions, it is better than the league average, so offensively this team seems to be much better than that on paper and at least since the break of the All-Star Game have been very good defensively.

The backbone of Maverick's success has been this increased synergy that we've seen between Kyrie and Luca over the past year and even a little bit earlier this year there were still some questions that people had about whether they were going to do it or not. work together, but we've seen them establish a seemingly stoppable two-man game into some truly excellent chemistry that has allowed the Mavericks to experience great offensive success. We've seen the Mavericks integrate Kyrie as a blocker for Luca and the The reason he's been so successful is because a lot of times teams will send two players to Luca when he comes off a screen to make sure he can't move downhill and that many times he will leave Kyrie open for a spot. opportunities, let's say you manage to avoid a pass towards him for a spot up, then you're tasked with keeping up with him by cutting off the ball and Kyrie is too fast and Shifty is going to lose you before you realize something is happening. happened, the Mavericks will run this Zoom action, which is an off-ball screen followed by a dribble handoff and Jimmy will continue to chase Luca around the screen while Rosier steps back a bit in anticipation of Gafford Luca's pick and roll, but this ends .

Leaving two defenders on Luca with Rosier paying attention to Gafford and this will leave Kyrie wide open on the wing for three Kyrie is a threat in space so when teams try to blitz Luca in the pick and roll with Kyrie as a blocker . you give Kyrie a lot of room to work and create good looks. One of the most promising factors is that we've seen the opposite of this, where it's not just Luca finding Kyrie when he's open to easy looks, but Kyrie has been creating. It also looks easy for Luca, the Mavericks will set up to run a stack pick and roll that involves their usual ball screen, but Luca will set up on the spot so he can block in the chat when Gafford rolls to the basket.

The problem it creates now is that Jaylen Williams is behind Kyrie on the play, so Chad has to make sure Gafford is covered on a potential lob pass and Dort needs to decide whether to contain Kyrie's advance or follow Luca so that Luca simply goes out to the perimeter to get the pass to catch and shoot three, the Maverick set up here to execute multiple dribble handoffs early in the half court offense, plus they can set up Kyrie with the ball on top as well as two sets screen off the ball with space down along the baseline.

The off-ball play is going to be this flare screen from Powell and the other one is what looks like it's going to be a Luca pin for Tim Hardaway Jr, but Luca is actually going to ghost the screen and slide to the basket and Kyrie Going to Find it easy for the end when the Mavericks have Luca and Kyrie on the court together, they have a half-court offensive rating of 108.3 points per 100 possessions, which places them in the 998th percentile of lineups in the league in Right now, let's talk a little. A little bit about the Mavericks' half-court offense because this is a really important piece of the puzzle when talking about how they will potentially perform in the playoffs.

We all know that the game slows down, defenses tighten and adjustments are made much more importantly. -fly in the postseason, so the question is whether the Mavericks are ready for that, and to me, based on what we've seen, it's hard to imagine they aren't. They have some pretty impressive offensive sets that they are running that require a It's already very difficult to guard a team going to the next level. This play will start with exom doing what is called an Iverson cut in which he will go from one side of the court to the other across the top of the key and will get two screens along the way. there, Luca will give it to kba and notice that Kyrie will be circling from one side of the court to the opposite wing.

It looks like kleo will pass to Kyrie or they will enter into a drip trade, but with the Heat it seems like he was already anticipating this. Kyrie instead makes a backdoor cut for KBA to meet on his way to the basket and that puts the Heat in defensive rotation, eventually leading to multiple closeouts to set up an open three-pointer. We saw them. running this exact same play against the Warriors from an out-of-bounds sideline and instead of just getting the defense into rotation, it actually just gave Kyrie an easy look at The Rim. Here they are going to perform a chin-and-horns action where they prepared. in a horn formation at Hardway junior, he'll take it to Gafford and cut to the basket using Kyrie's chin screen at the elbow.

This will draw Jimmy's attention, so Luca will take advantage of those turns and attention to cut off Kyrie. pin so he can receive Gafford's pass where they can then go into the pick and roll and with Jimmy guarding gaffard on the roll it will leave Kyrie wide open on the wing for the pass and they will get an easy three. The good thing about this play is that they don't even necessarily need to run the score after the initial back screen because we saw against the Jazz that they can easily create an open shot on The Rim if the defense doesn't do it. ready to provide help, even apart from these high-quality midfield sets, they have the threat that Luca can generate offense at any time simply by driving the ball and forcing more defensive attention and there is no doubt that he will be able to divert that attention .

In a good look for one of his teammates, the same goes for Kyrie, the Heat began to accept the fact that they were going to have to bend him to get the ball out of his hands in their matchup, but the Mavericks had no problem capitalize it. those open looks that come up as a result, but offense isn't really this team's problem, it's that when people talk about this Mavericks team and the potential concerns for them in a postseason environment, defensive concerns usually come up, we know that their defense has been much better lately, especially since they acquired Daniel Gafford and PJ Washington, but is it good enough right now?

Their defense has been strong enough to have the personnel to hold water and allow their offense to do much of the heavy lifting without bleeding points. On the defensive end, Gafford and PJ have added a lot of versatility to their defensive infrastructure, as PJ can guard the perimeter and make some shifts, and Gafford has been a really solid weakside shot blocker and overall deterrent and rebounder of the hoop. One of the most important wild cards will be Derek Lively. He's been out since March 31 with a sprained knee and the Mavericks plan to keep him out for the rest of the regular season to give him more time to rest.

If he doesn't return, that means their depth will be quite hampered and the fact that Gafford and Lively being healthy really allowed the Mavericks to basically get 48 straight minutes of players doing essentially the same things at a very high level. I think Lively is a little better. a defenseman, so having him and Gafford able to play freely will be huge for Dallas, but really the Mavericks have one of the

biggest

things working in their favor and that is Luca Donic, even outside of everything I've talked about on this video. We know that Luca being Luca is good enough to get your foot in the door on a series.

The difference between previous Dallas teams that we've seen fit into the playoffs is that this team now has Kyrie Irving alongside Luca and the supporting cast. These two are by far the best teams the West has seen right now and I can almost guarantee that almost all of them don't want to deal with Dallas, they came from a team that was in the outside tier of contention now looks like it belongs to that level of high-level Contender with some of the best teams in the league. If you enjoyed this video and want to see more like it, be sure to subscribe and leave a like, that's the easiest way to support. and help me continue creating content.

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