HOUSTON – Forward Klay Thompson summed up the Dallas Mavericks’ recent difficult journey around the NBA circles after they played
four games in six days, and in three different time zones.
The trip started last Friday in Phoenix (Mountain Time Zone) and continued Saturday in Portland (Pacific Time Zone), with the distance from Phoenix to Portland encompassing over 1,000 miles. Then on Monday, the Mavs played in Sacramento (Pacific Time Zone) before finishing up the trip in Houston (Central Time Zone) on Wednesday. By all accounts, it was a brutal road trip for the Mavs.
“That back-to-back in Portland and Phoenix was really hard,” Thompson said. “I don’t think I’ve traveled that distance in a back-to-back in my (14-year) career.
“But that’s why they pay us is to give great effort nightly. And we are very excited to go home.”
The Mavs won their game in Phoenix, but lost the last three. And they played all four games without superstar point guard Luka Dončić, who has a left calf strain.
In addition, forward Naji Marshall missed the past three games because of a four-game suspension handed down by the NBA due to his involvement in a fracas in Phoenix. And guard Dante Exum – penciled in the Mavs’ rotation before this season – has yet to play this year due to surgery on his right wrist.
All of these are legitimate reasons why the Mavs were out of sorts against Houston. But to their credit, they never used the absence of key players as reasons why they blew a 10-point first-quarter lead and fell to the Rockets, 110-99.
“We just turned the ball over,” said coach Jason Kidd, alluding to his team’s 20 turnovers that directly led to 22 points for Houston. “We had turnovers and that’s what they thrive on.
“When you turn the ball over as much as we did, it puts our transition defense in harm’s way and they took advantage of that.”
Kidd and his players believe in the next man up theory as a way of keeping the Mavs afloat until the rest of the key players are able to play.
“And we believe that we always have a chance to win,” Kidd said. “Unfortunately, we didn’t win these last (three) games on the road.
“We can learn from it, and now we got to go back home.”
The Mavs will entertain the Cleveland Cavaliers on Friday. It’s a Cavs’ team that has the NBA’s best record at 29-4.
In order to upend the Cavs, Thompson said it’s imperative that the Mavs “cut down those turnovers in half, play physical defense and believe in each other. That should do it.”
Here are the takeaways from the 11-point loss to the Rockets.
NOT ENOUGH SHOT ATTEMPTS: The Mavs shot a very respectable 53.3 percent from the field and an equally respectable 39.3 percent from beyond the three-
point arc. The 20 turnovers the Mavs had didn’t help their cause. Plus, the Rockets attempted 89 field goals while the Mavs had just 75 field goal attempts.
“BABY JOKIC” WAS A FACTOR: Lately, folks have been describing Rockets center Alperen Sengun as a poor man’s version of Denver Nuggets superstar center Nikola Jokic. Well, Sengun was able to fill up the stat sheet on Wednesday as he finished with a game-high 23 points, six rebounds, a game-high six steals and four assists. He also was 9-of-16 from the field.
THE BIG TURNAROUND: The Mavs got off to a very fast start as they held a 16-6 lead less than five minutes into the game. Then, they started turning the ball over, and the Rockets started marching to the free throw line, where they attempted 19 charity tosses in the first half. Houston ended the first half on a 55-36 run and led, 61-52 at the half.
X: @DwainPrice
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