Luka Dončić has never really been a candidate for All-Defensive teams, but his work on defense Thursday represented a low point for one of the NBA’s best young players, despite another brilliant game on offense.
The situation: draw with 10 seconds remaining between the Dallas Mavericks and Utah Jazz. Klay Thompson had just tied it via a 3-point basket with 27 seconds remaining and the ball was in the hands of Jordan Clarkson at the top of the arc.
Dončić was tasked with guarding Jazz forward John Collins. He settled himself between Collins and the ball and waited. And I waited. Well, let’s see what happened.
Dončić, for some reason, focused on the already guarded Collin Sexton and let Collins get past him for the most open dunk you’ll ever see.
To be fair, it wasn’t a video record for the rest of the Mavericks defense either. Big man Derek Lively II stood on the other side of the paint, but he might have been able to stop Collins if he had helped earlier. At the very least, he could have forced Collins to make another pass. Naji Marshall could have also done a better job covering Marshall’s pass.
The basket is still on Doncic. Modern NBA defense is a lot more complicated than most fans realize, but the goal boils down to preventing a ball handler from making the face Clarkson did when he saw Dončić really wasn’t tracking Collins.
There might have been some redemption for Dončić on the next play, when he sent the ball to an open Grimes in the corner, but Marshall, a career .307 3-point shooter, missed the potential game-winner.
Dončić is responsible for the defensive error speaking with reporters after the match:
“I misread. I thought I was going to hit and (Quentin) Grimes thought he was going to hit…We misread the bench. It’s my fault.”
Jason Kidd, Mavericks head coach also blamed the play on a communication problem:
“Communication. There was a problem. It happens and they took full advantage of it. We have to be better.”
It’s unfair, however, to paint Dončić as the reason the Mavericks lost. He may have had a defensive miscue, but he also had 37 points on 13-of-25 shooting with nine assists and seven rebounds. His career has been built on his offensive genius outweighing his lack of defense and arguably that’s what happened on Thursday.
And yet this piece also highlights what makes Dončić so frustrating. Collins didn’t score because he was faster than Dončić or more skilled. He scored because Dončić had lost track of his man with the match on the line and thought someone, Quentin Grimes, was going to save him despite being in an even worse position.
The loss drops the Mavericks to 5-7 on the season, which is not the way you want to track an NBA Finals berth.
