Often when he misses a three-point shot, Luka Doncic looks up to the ceiling of the arena with this “why me” look on his face, as if to wonder why his long distance shot has suddenly deserted him.
In Wednesday’s game against the Toronto Raptors, that look of anguish was not a part of Doncic’s makeup. Especially down the stretch.
With the Mavs desperately trying to stave off the hard-charging Raptors, Doncic buried a cold-blooded three-pointer with one minute remaining that pushed Dallas ahead by four points. That critical bucket from downtown turned out to be the impetus the Mavs used to gut out a hard-fought 102-98 triumph over the Raptors before a sellout crowd of 19,218 at American Airlines Center.
The win was the 10th in the past 11 games for the Mavs and padded their record to 26-19. Coupled with a pair of other Wednesday night games — Milwaukee’s 126-114 victory over Memphis and Houston’s surprising 116-111 road win over Utah – the Mavs are now just three games in the loss column behind both the Grizzlies (31-16) and Jazz (29-16) for the Western Conference’s No. 3 and No. 4 seeds, respectively.
Meanwhile, it took a herculean performance from Doncic for the Mavs to squeeze by the Raptors. The two-time All-Star finished with a season-high 41 points, a season-high tying 14 rebounds and seven assists as he all but dragged the Mavs across the finish line.
“He did a great job from start to finish,” coach Jason Kidd said. “He was aggressive, he got to the paint, he got to the free throw line and then he made some big threes for us.
“And then also, he just accepted the double-team and trusted his teammates when he let go of the ball. So he was great tonight.”
More importantly from Doncic’s perspective, his three-ball was finally finding its intended destination. In the five games before Wednesday, Doncic was a dismal 4-of-33 from downtown, including 0-of-6 during Monday’s victory over Oklahoma City.
But against the Raptors, Doncic was 4-of-10 from the three-point stripe, including that crucial dagger that staggered the Raptors and sent them to their locker room nursing a 21-21 record.
“It’s a long three,” Doncic said. “We go up four with a minute to go. It’s a great feeling. I’ve got to keep trusting my shot and let it go.”
This was a night when Doncic let a lot of shots go. And the Mavs needed every ounce of his powerful offensive punch, because Kristaps Porzingis (18 points, seven boards) and Tim Hardaway Jr. (16 points) were the only other Dallas players who played significant minutes that didn’t struggle on the offensive side of the court.
Then again, with their long arms and penchant for filling the passing lanes and piling up steals, the Raptors have a way of disrupting another team’s offense.
“They’re long, they’re aggressive on defense (and) they’re looking for steals,” Kidd said of the Raptors. “They’re number one in
deflection and they’re number three in steals.
“Toronto is playing at a very, very high level.”
Doncic was playing at such a high level that during an eight-minute stretch of the fourth quarter, he scored 11 of the Mavs’ 14 points and got the assist – a three-pointer by Reggie Bullock – on the other three points.
Toronto was led by Pascal Siakam (20 points, eight rebounds, three steals), OG Anunoby (19 points, eight boards, three steals) and Fred VanVleet (18 points, 12 assists). Also for Toronto, Chris Boucher contributed 15 points, 12 rebounds and three steals, Precious Achiuwa collected 12 points and Scottie Barnes added 11 points.
The Raptors got very aggressive with Doncic, they knocked him in the head and on the floor, and double-teamed him. None of the tactics had a measurable effect on the fourth-year point guard.
“A lot of teams that we play are physical,” Doncic said. “We try to be physical the same on the defensive end.”
Raptors coach Nick Nurse even tried his hand at distracting Doncic.
“Every time I was going down on the fast break he was yelling: ‘He’s carrying (the ball),’ “ Doncic said. “Almost every offense. You can’t yell ‘carry’ every offense. It’s not a carry.”
In carrying the Mavs on this night, Doncic was 13-of-24 from the field and 11-of-12 from the charity stripe. He poured in 22 of his points in the first half, which ended with the Mavs clinging to a 55-54 lead at intermission.
An alley-oop dunk by Dorian Finney-Smith off a pass from Jalen Brunson, a jumper by Brunson, a tap-in from Josh Green via a feed from Doncic and a fast break layup by Hardaway helped the Mavs’ lead balloon to 80-70 late in the third quarter.
But the Raptors kept coming until a VanVleet triple gave Toronto a 96-95 lead with 1:55 remaining.
Doncic then negotiated a nifty spin move to his left and banked in a soft shot off the glass. A short time later, he popped in that huge three-pointer to give the Mavs some breathing room and pad their cushion to 100-96 with one minute left.
A dunk by Boucher got the Raptors within 100-98 of the Mavs with 45.6 seconds remaining. Then, after a Porzingis turnover, VanVleet and Boucher each missed a three-pointer before Finney-Smith secured the defensive rebound for the Mavs with 7.1 seconds left.
Then, following two Dallas timeouts, Hardaway lofted the inbounds pass high in the air, which Porzingis snagged. Fouled on the play, Porzingis calmly nailed a couple of free throws with 5.6 seconds left to ice the game.
“We made some big shots,” Kidd said. “Reggie made a big shot. Timmie made a huge play at the end by getting the inbound ball to KP, then KP made two big free throws for us.”
The Mavs will have very little time to celebrate this victory as they’ll play host to the defending Western Conference champion Phoenix Suns on Thursday at 6:30 p.m. The Suns come to AAC packing the best record in the entire NBA at 34-9 and have won
seven of their last eight games.
Before leaving, Doncic said of the Suns: “They have the best record in the league and they have an amazing team. You saw it last year and you saw it this year.”
Twitter: @DwainPrice
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