Josh Green looked like the proverbial deer in a headlight during the first two games of the Dallas Mavericks’ first-round
playoff series against the Utah Jazz. But that all changed Thursday when the Mavs won Game 3, 126-118.
Not only was Green helping set the tempo with his offense. He also was a major pest for the Jazz on the defensive end of the floor.
In the first half Thursday, Green contributed 10 points, six assists and two steals in 11 minutes as the Mavs led, 68-51, at intermission. Overall, Green wound up with 12 points, three rebounds, six assists and two steals in 19 minutes.
“I think going into the game, obviously I was struggling shooting my threes the first couple of games,’ said Green, who was 3-of-5 from behind the three-point line in Game 3. “For me just going in knowing that I shot well in the regular season, go in with the same attitude. At the end of the day if you want to make them you’ve got to take them.
“It’s always good to have the coaches trust, the coaches behind you, the coaches talking to you – (telling me to) ‘shoot it every time. Every time you’re open, shoot it.’ That means so much, not just for me, but the whole team in general. It gets us on a roll, it shows that the coaches 
trust us. We really trust what the coaches are doing and the coaches’ game plan, and it’s how we execute that and go out and play as a team and play for each other.”
And with Jalen Brunson executing his way for 31 points, the Mavs had seven players score at least 12 points.
“It just shows what the team is about and what we’re willing to do to win the game,” Green said. “It’s unselfish play, overall it’s great and we’re just going to keep doing it.”
Here are our five takeaways from the Mavs’ eight-point victory in Game 3 of this series.
BRUNSON’S ALL-STAR PERFORMANCE: Jalen Brunson is acting like if he played all 82 games of a regular season against the Utah Jazz, he would be an All-Star. That’s how dominant he’s been in a series that includes Jazz All-Stars Donovan Mitchell, Rudy Gobert and Mike Conley. The best player in this series has clearly been Brunson. His dribble penetration and drive-and-kick game has been textbook material that every player with NBA aspirations should study. Brunson has put the Jazz defense in such a pretzel that they’re having difficulties un-twisting their way out of this mangled situation. In Game 3, Brunson tallied 31 points on 12-of-22 shots. Adding the 41 points he scored in Game 2 to the equation, Brunson joins Mark Aguirre, Rolando Blackman, Nick Van Exel, Dirk Nowitzki, Monta Ellis and Luka Doncic as the only Mavs players to score at least 30 points in consecutive playoff games. In the three games in this series, Brunson is averaging 32 ppg, 5.3 rpg and 5.0 apg while shooting 50.7 percent from the field and 41.2 percent from three-point range. In short, those are All-Star type numbers.
KLEBER CONTINUES HIS IMPACT: Just to show that his shooting slump days are way, way behind him, Maxi Kleber hopped off the bench Thursday and immediately started doing to the Jazz what he did to them in Game 2. Kleber buried a trio of three-pointers in less than four minutes when he entered the game in the first quarter for the first time. His nine points were a game-high at that time for a Mavs team that led, 27-20, after the first quarter. Kleber finished the night with 17 points in just 22 minutes. He was 6-of-7 from the floor, including 4-of-5 from downtown. And that came on the heels of his show-stopping performance in Game 2 when he tossed in eight three-pointers in 11
attempts and finished with 25 points – one shy of his career high. Kleber has the Jazz in such a pickle that centers Rudy Gobert and Hassan Whiteside has some tough decisions to make. They either leave Kleber wide open in the corner and stay home and protect the rim from those hard-charging Mavs players who drive to the basket. Or they vacate the basket area and slide over to the corners to guard Kleber. If they do the latter, the Mavs have a cake walk to the basket. Decisions, decisions, decisions all created by the sharp-shooting from Kleber.
BENCH WAS DOMINANT: There were those who thought the Mavs’ bench would be at a huge disadvantage because Spencer Dinwiddie was thrust into the starting lineup due to Luka Doncic missing all three games in this series with a sprained left calf. But that certainly wasn’t the case in Game 3. Showing just how deep they really are, the Mavs’ bench warmers had a field day outscoring their Utah counterparts, 49-24. That includes 17 points from Maxi Kleber, 15 from Davis Bertans and 12 from Josh Green. In fact, all three of those players had already reached double-figure scoring by halftime, which is an amazing feat itself. The Mavs’ bench finished the game 14-of-21 from the field – they were 11-of-17 from beyond the three-point arc — and also collected 13 rebounds. By contrast, the much more heralded Utah bench was 9-of-16 from the field, 2-of-6 from downtown and accounted for 11 rebounds. Jordan Clarkson – the NBA’s Sixth Man award winner in 2021 – led the Jazz reserves with 14 points on 5-of-9 shooting. The Mavs’ reserves outscored Utah starters Mike Conley, Rudy Gobert and Royce O’Neale, 49-38, and battled that trio to a 13-13 stalemate on the boards.
DINWIDDIE’S DUNK: Sooner or later it was bound to happen. And when it did, if the Internet didn’t break, it probably came very close to fracturing. With 8:26 remaining in the third quarter, Spencer Dinwiddie was on the right wing and saw 7-1 Jazz center Rudy Gobert sliding a 
bit to protect the left corner. At that moment, Dinwiddie took off towards the hoop around the same time Gobert slid back into the lane to protect the basket. At about the time Gobert skied to show off the Defensive Player of the Year awards he won in 2018, ’19 and ’21, Dinwiddie skied to show off the acrobatic skills that was one of the reasons the Mavs parted ways with Kristaps Porzingis two months ago so they could get him on their roster. And in one of those picture perfect mano a mano moments, Dinwiddie dunked the ball right in Gobert’s face, and everyone on the Mavs’ bench leapt high into the sky and threw a wild party. Gobert fouled Dinwiddie on the play, and the Mavs’ guard completed the three-point play to put Dallas ahead, 74-58. Considering the magnificent sheepskin on Gobert’s wall for his sterling work on the defensive end of the floor, the dunk by Dinwiddie goes down as one of more scintillating dunks of the entire 2021-’22 season. It’s surely one Dinwiddie and Gobert will probably never forget.
CROWD WASN’T A FACTOR: Because the Mavs got off to such a great start in Game 3, that usually very boisterous Utah Jazz home crowd wasn’t much of a factor Thursday. Yeah, there were moments when the crowd was able to fully express themselves. The crowd went wild when Rudy Gobert negotiated a reverse lob dunk off a perfect feed from Mike Conley, which got the Jazz within 50-41 of the Mavs late in the second quarter. And when Donovan Mitchell sliced and diced his way to scoring 18 of his 32 points in the third quarter, the crowd was in a frenzy. Also, the noise was deafening inside Vivint Arena when Utah completed a 38-22 run to come back from a 17-point deficit and inch to within 103-102 of the Mavs with 6:40 remaining in the game. But for the most part, because the Mavs got off to a great start and maintained a healthy lead for the majority of the game, they never allowed the crowd to become a factor. “This is a crazy gym here,” Mavs center Maxi Kleber said. “The fans are really loud. We know (Utah is) going to make runs. It’s just part of basketball. We still knew that we could win this game. We didn’t back down. It’s like a really tough gym to play in.” The Mavs, though, survived and got out of Game 3 with a victory.
Twitter: @DwainPrice
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