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DALLAS — For such a copycat league, NBA teams use different terminologies for the same concepts. When a player is traded, understanding a new playbook is more like learning a new language, another dialect, for the same actions and ideas his previous employer described differently. The playoffs, for example, are littered with All-Stars calling for ball screens, forcing a switch of defenders, allowing that playmaker to isolate against his preferred matchup. The Mavericks call this “elephant hunting” as these Western Conference champions routinely found optimal opponents for Luka Dončić or Kyrie Irving to ambush on islands across the first three rounds of this postseason.
Rudy Gobert was one such victim, the “elephant” Dončić hunted at the end of Game 2 in Minnesota. And as these NBA Finals shifted back to Dallas, with the Mavericks facing the same 2-0 deficit to which Dončić’s dagger sunk the Timberwolves, Dallas was sure to prioritize picking on certain Celtics defenders in all of Dončić’s and Irving’s perimeter pick-and-rolls and dribble handoffs.
Luka Dončić of the Dallas Mavericks pleads with officials in the third quarter against the Boston Celtics in Game 3 of the 2024 NBA Finals at American Airlines Center on June 12, 2024, in Dallas. (Photo by Tim Heitman/Getty Images)
“We were trying to put Al Horford in it, any other elephants, and try to get the mismatches,” Mavericks center Dereck Lively II said Wednesday night after a 106-99 Boston win that has the Celtics up 3-0 and within sniffing distance of the franchise’s 18th championship. “Get the space and get the shots that we like.”
Those elephants can also be the smallest members of Boston’s deep roster. “When you have Luka going against Payton Pritchard or [Derrick] White in the post, somebody else in the post, we feel really good about it,” said Irving.
The major problem for Dallas, the elephant in the American Airlines Center, is that Dončić poses as that very target for Boston’s ball-handlers. For all his gifts, for all his wizardry orchestrating the Mavericks’ offense, for his no-look dishes and his…
Source link : https://sports.yahoo.com/2024-nba-finals-the-elephant-in-the-room–luka-doncics-defense-isnt-good-enough-for-the-mavs-to-win-a-title-062002014.html
Author : Yahoo Sports
Publish date : 2024-06-13 06:20:02
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