After fueling the Mavericks to a Game 3 win on Saturday, the Dallas Mavericks officially have a lead in the series that will determine who makes the Western Conference Finals. Despite the early success, however, Luka Doncic is preaching focus as he reminds his teammates that the mission is not yet completed.
“If you’re here, you gotta believe. I believe we can,” said Luka. “But it’s gonna be hard, we didn’t do nothing yet, we won two games and we need to win four. We didn’t do anything yet, we just gotta keep going.”
Luka: "If you're here, you gotta believe…We didn't do nothing yet, we won two games." pic.twitter.com/5lpHcow4CY
— NBA TV (@NBATV) May 11, 2024
The Mavs have looked solid in the second half of the season and you have to believe they are a serious threat to win it all. Particularly, they’ve found success with Daniel Gafford in the lineup and his arrival in February has changed the entire defensive identity of the Mavericks.
In Game 3, however, it was on offense where Gafford shined. He was the hero of the night with a team-high 27 points on 47.8% shooting, including 5-12 from downtown.
Luka, by his standards, has been mediocre at best in this series and he struggled to shoot the ball tonight with just 22 points on 41% shooting. He also finished with 4 turnovers. In the end, however, it was still enough for the Mavericks to pull away in this game and now they find themselves just two wins away from the Conference Finals.
No doubt, the Mavericks smell blood in the water and they will go for the critical hit in two days when they have a chance to go up 3-1 in the series. Luka will likely have to play better for the Mavericks to take that one but with the way that Kyrie Irving and Daniel Gafford have been playing lately, he may not have to be at his best for this steam to make a deep run this year.
Dallas Mavericks Can Win The NBA Championship
The last time the Mavericks were this close to the championship was back in 2022 when Jalen Brunson and Luka Doncic won back-to-back series over the Utah Jazz and Phoenix Suns. That year, they lost to the Warriors in five games, who would go on to win the title.
This year, while the Mavericks do not have Brunson, they do have Kyrie Irving and his play has been a godsend for the Mavericks through the first two rounds. With a scoring average of 23.3 points per game, Irving is more than delivering on expectations as the star point guard and co-star to Luka.
Between Kyrie’s resurgence and the red-hot play of Daniel Gafford, who has enhanced the team on both ends of the floor, the Mavericks have proven to be a formidable opponent and they are pushing the top-seeded Thunder to the absolute brink.
But the work is just beginning for the Mavericks and they still have two more games to win just to close this current series out. With so much stacked against them, Luka and the guys cannot afford to lose their focus now and take their eye off the prize. They must stay locked in until the very end, and Luka is doing whatever he can to keep his teammates ready for the fight ahead.
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