Warriors Vs. Mavericks 2/6/2021

The Mavericks came into this game after an embarrassing loss to the Warriors on Thursday. They had also lost 7 of their past 8 games entering this one. The Warriors came into this game coming off of a nice win against the Mavs where Oubre Jr. had 40 points. The Warriors also still had both of their centers out entering this game. For the Warriors to win they needed to ride their momentum from their last game, rebound, and make sure to keep Luka Dončić and Kristaps Porzingis under 30 points each. For the Mavericks to win they needed to take advantage of the Warriors injuries, score very well, and play good defense on Oubre Jr. and Stephen Curry so that they didn’t have more of the same issues as on Thursday. Did the Warriors get another strong win or did the Mavericks comeback after a rough loss and take the win? To the game!

The Mavericks won the tip which led to a Luka Dončić layup and free throw after multiple misses from each team. At 10:02 Andrew Wiggins made a layup to give the Warriors their first points of the game. At 9:02 Luka Dončić made 2 of 3 free throws to give the Mavericks a 10 point lead. The Mavericks went on an 18-2 run to start the quarter. At 7:26 Dončić made a 3 to give the Mavs a 16 point lead. At 6:51 Curry got a 4 point play to lower the Mavericks lead to 12. At 5:16 Rick Carlisle called a timeout after a Warriors 7-0 run to make the score 18-9. That 7-0 run ended up being a 10-0 run with a Bazemore 3. At 2:52 Bazemore made a layup to lower the deficit to 4 points. At the end of the first quarter the Mavericks were leading 35-31. Kent Bazemore had an amazing first quarter with 12 points off the bench. The Warriors did surprisingly well on the rebounding side of the ball once again having just as many as the Mavericks. The Warriors didn’t hold the Mavericks to bad shooting splits but they did get 4 steals and 2 blocks and the Mavericks had no steals or blocks. The Mavericks interestingly shot the same from the field as they did from 3. The Mavericks shot 50% from the field and 50% from 3 point range. The Warriors shot 43.5% from the field and 45.5% from 3. The Mavericks were able to take an early lead in the first quarter but the Warriors came back and cut the deficit to 4 going into the second quarter where they hoped to take the lead.

At 11:33 Dwight Powell made a layup which Wiggins followed up with a jumper for the first few points of the second quarter. From the start of the quarter to 7:03 the Mavericks maintained around a 7 point lead until 7:03 when Porzingis made a layup to give the Mavericks a 10 point lead. At 5:09 Kent Bazemore made 2 free throws to lower the deficit to 5 points. At 3:12 Curry made a 3 to give him 22 and make the Mavs lead 4. With 1.2 seconds to go Dončić made a floater to give the Mavericks a 72-64 lead at halftime. The Warriors had 8 turnovers compared to the Mavericks 6 turnovers at halftime. The Warriors also had 6 more fouls than the Mavs with 14 at halftime. Draymond had a great first half with 5 rebounds, 8 assists, 4 steals, and 3 blocks. Curry also had an amazing first half with 30 points and 7 threes. Dončić played well for the Mavericks in the first half with 21 points, 5 rebounds, and 5 assists. The Mavericks won both quarters by 4 points and had 4 more rebounds than the Warriors in the second quarter which was one of the reasons that they were leading. The shooting splits were 50% from the field and 45.5% from 3 for the Warriors and 50% from the field and 47.4% from downtown for the Mavericks. The Mavericks played a pretty good 1st half and hoped to carry their momentum into the 3rd quarter. To the third!

To start off the 3rd quarter Andrew Wiggins made a jumper to make it a 5 point game. At 10:54 Pozingis made a dunk for the Mavericks first points of the quarter. At 10:11 Luka Dončić made a 3 to make it an 11 point game. At 8:21 Curry made 3 free throws to lower the deficit to 3. At 7:35 Curry made an extremely deep 3 from the logo to make the Mavs lead 86-85. At 6:43 Juan Toscano-Anderson got a dunk to tie the game. Dončić then took back the lead after making 2 of 3 free throws. At 4:11 Andrew Wiggins made a 3 to give the Warriors their first lead of the game. At 3:30 Maxi Kleber made 2 free throws to take the lead for the Mavericks. At 1:15 Kent Bazemore dunked it in for the first points for either team in over 2 minutes and to take the lead. To end the quarter Tim Hardaway Jr. made a stepback 3 to give the Mavericks a 106-101 lead going into the 4th quarter. The Warriors ended up winning the 3rd quarter by 3 points with the help of Curry and his 46 points. Dončić also played well and had 31 points after the 3rd. The Warriors had 9 more rebounds than the Mavericks in the 3rd quarter but after the 3rd quarter also had 4 more turnovers. Both teams kept shooting well with 53.8% from the field and 45.9% from deep for the Warriors and 46.5% from 2 and 45.5% from 3 for the Mavericks.

To start the final quarter Powell made a layup to take a 7 point lead. At 11:02 Wiggins made a jumper to give the Warriors their first points of the quarter. At 10:09 Luka Dončić made a 3 to give the Mavericks a 10 point lead. At 8:27 Andrew Wiggins made a fadeaway jumper to make it a 5 point game. At 7:09 Jalen Brunson made a 3 to make it 10 point game once again. At 5:53 Wiggins made a 3 to lower the Mavs’ lead back down to 5. At 2:02 Stephen Curry made a layup to make it a 4 point game and give him 51 points. With 44.5 seconds left in the game Luka Dončić made a 3 to make it a 7 point game after the refs botched a call when the ball went out of bounds and let the play go on. With 6.3 seconds to go in the game Maxi Kleber made a 3 to make it a 4 point game with 5.6 seconds to play. The Mavericks held on to win 134-132.

Leo’s Courtside Commentary: The Warriors started off terribly which led to them playing from behind almost the whole game. Stephen Curry’s 57 points wasn’t enough to get the win in this game due to Luka Dončić tying his career high with 42 points. One of the reasons the Warriors lost were that they had 7 less rebounds than the Mavs. Also that unlike last game the Warriors didn’t do better than the Mavericks on the assists even though Draymond had 15 of them, they had the same amount of assists as the Mavericks. Kelly Oubre Jr. wasn’t able to repeat or even play half as well as he did in their last game which made it a lot tougher to win. The Warriors also fouled a bit too much and had a couple more turnovers than the Mavs. On the bright side the Warriors had 4 more blocks and 6 more steals than the Mavs. Both teams shot very well with 53.5% from the field and 44.4% from deep for the Warriors and 45.8% from the field and 44.7% from behind the arc for the Mavericks. The play with 44.5 seconds left in the game proved to be very important because it ended with a 3 pointer and without it the Warriors would’ve won. The Mavericks also got somewhat lucky at the end when Maxi Kleber made a 3 to seal the game. Both teams played pretty well in this game. Overall, this was a very entertaining game with a very bitter ending for the Warriors.