The Mavericks endured one game without Luka Dončić on Sunday night and they won’t know if he will be gone longer until they re-evaluate their superstar point guard Monday in Houston.

Coach Rick Carlisle confirmed during his pregame media session that Dončić would be out against the Chicago Bulls with a left quadricep contusion suffered in the Miami game on Friday.

The Mavericks lost that game 118-108 and while Jalen Brunson (31 points) did a terrific job as Luka’s replacement in the starting lineup, there’s nothing like having one of the MVP favorites in your arsenal.

“It happened late in the second quarter,” Carlisle said before Sunday’s game. “He’ll be listed day to day. So we’ll see where he is (Monday).”

The Mavericks have their first back-to-back set of games of the season when they visit Houston on Monday. They then have two days off before playing at Denver on Thursday.

“We’ll see how he is tomorrow,” Carlisle said. “I don’t think this is a long-term thing, but we’ll just have to see how he feels when he gets up and see if tomorrow’s going to be a possibility or not.”

The 6-7 Dončić is averaging 24.4 points, 7.6 rebounds and 6.4 assists per game.

Regardless of whether Dončić plays in Houston, the Mavericks will be facing a tough bounce-back situation against a Rockets’ team that has won its last two games.

But Carlisle put that into perspective.

“We have a very difficult schedule to start the season,” he said. “You know what? It’s a game tomorrow (Monday). We’re coming off a disappointing game. I’m looking forward to competing again. I’m pretty sure our guys are too.

“We got to play the schedule out the way it falls for us. (Griping) about it is not going to do any good. We got to have a good attitude about it, go down there and compete our butts off.”

Porzingis getting closer: The news was considerably better in regard to Kristaps Porzingis, who continues his rehab from arthroscopic meniscus surgery in October.

Carlisle said that Porzingis had his longest full-court workout of the season on Saturday during an optional practice.

“He played full-court for about 35 minutes with our young guys and some of our lower-minute guys,” Carlisle said. “He did well. He’s feeling the fatigue in his legs, as you can certainly understand. This is all part of the process of coming back from a minor surgery two-plus months ago.”

One of the things working against the 7-3 Porzingis is that the Mavericks are not going to have a lot of practice time in the coming days.

“In terms of the timetable . . . as we look at this week, there’s no practice today or (Monday) obviously with two games. Tuesday will be an off day coming off the back-to-back. Wednesday will be a practice day and then we leave for Denver.

“There’s nothing imminent with him playing in terms of a target date. But we’re a lot closer than we were.”

Bulls ride LaVine, hustle plays: The Mavericks were burned by two things Sunday night.

One was Chicago guard Zach LaVine, who rolled up 39 points, six rebounds, five assists and three steals.

The other was a poor showing when it came to what Carlisle called 50-50 balls. He said the Mavericks, by their count, got only 25 percent of those available possessions.

“You got to come up with balls that are up for grabs and equally available to either team,” Carlisle said. “You got to get at least half of them. And coming up with a quarter of them just isn’t good enough.”

And then there was LaVine, who had 21 of his points in the first quarter when he kept the Bulls afloat as most of his teammates struggled to score.

“He’s an underrated playmaker,” Carlisle said. “People will characterize him as a scorer, a guy who can score in bunches and a guy who has the ability to get very hot. You give him an open shot, he’s going to make it.”

The Mavericks found that out early and often.

Remembering “Westy”: Hall of famer Paul Westphal died on Saturday after battling brain cancer.

After his legendary playing career, in which he was an all-star five times, Westphal had a successful coaching career, leading Phoenix to the NBA finals in 1993.

He also was an assistant coach for Avery Johnson with the Mavericks in 2007-08.

“Wonderful man,” Carlisle said. “Tremendous basketball man. One of the all-time underrated players in the game. You go back and look at what he did in his career. He was all-NBA a bunch of times. He was an all-star a bunch of times. It was great to see him enshrined to the Naismith Memorial Hall of Fame a year and a half ago.

“I never really knew him. And then I did television for Seattle during the year I was doing kind of a sabbatical, and got to know him under those circumstances and he was just a tremendous person to be around. Very giving. I was not aware that this struggle was going on. So it was very, very shocking to me. Obviously thoughts and prayers go out to his family.”

Twitter: @ESefko

 

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