Tonight, Dirk Nowitzki moved past Kevin Garnett (1,462) for fourth place on the all-time games played list. Up next at No. 3 is Karl Malone, who played in 1,476 games. If Dirk plays in every contest for the rest of the season, he’ll end the 2017-18 campaign one game shy of tying the Mailman. A return for season No. 21 would obviously mean he’d pass Malone, so long as he played in at least two games.
Yogi Ferrell handed out a career-high 12 assists.
Dwight Powell has made his last five 3-point attempts and 9 of his last 16 overall.
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This was easily the best game Jones has played as a pro. If he brings this kind of energy every night and continues to knock down jumpers and defend multiple positions, he’s going to earn a contract at this level. Currently he’s only on a two-way deal with the Mavs, but there’s no way he’s flying under the radar anymore after the game he played tonight. He was super productive.
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That was a smooth spin into an up-fake, then Motley stepped through without dragging the pivot foot and finished through contact for an and-1. Really nice play. He was an excellent post-up scorer in college and has been good in that regard for the Legends as well, so it’s no surprise that it’s translating over to the NBA. Motley finished with a career-high eight points and career-best six boards tonight. He has enough eligible days remaining on his two-way contract to spend the rest of the season with the Mavericks if that’s how the Mavs want to play it. He could also be sent down to get more minutes with the Legends, as well, but at this point it’s looking like he’ll be with the big club for at least a majority of the rest of the way.
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Smith did a lot of things well on that possession, but his craftiest trick was feeling D’Angelo Russell on his hip and then stuck out his butt to take Russell out of the play. From there, he stared down Nets center Jarrett Allen before quickly lobbing a pass over his head to Dwight Powell for an alley-oop. Smith is an amazing athlete and can zoom to the rim whenever he wants, but sometimes playing at 50 percent speed is even more dangerous to the opposing defense. If Smith can develop the ability to play fast, slow, and at every speed in between, he’s going to be a heck of a player in the pick-and-roll. He finished with five assists on the night to go along with his 21 points on 9-of-17 shooting.
The Mavs (22-48) will play the New Orleans Pelicans (39-29) on Tuesday at the Smoothie King Center at 7 p.m. Central.
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