LA Clippers, Dallas Mavs give us a competitive potential playoff preview

LA Clippers, Dallas Mavericks give us a competitive preview

The NBA’s restart has proved all doubters wrong about the quality of basketball. Nearly every game in Orlando has been extremely competitive proving the NBA did the best job they could to give fans everything they wanted in basketball’s return. The marquee matchup between the LA Clippers and Dallas Mavericks Thursday night proved to be continuing that trend.

A matchup that features two Western Conference playoff contenders along with some of the brightest stars in the NBA was back and forth affair all the way down to the fourth quarter. After a surge in the last few minutes by the Clippers, the result was a lopsided 126-111 win for Los Angeles.

The game, though, could just be the beginning of things to come after this round of seeding games. As things stand currently, the second seed Clippers currently are set to face the Mavericks who currently hold the seventh seed in the first round.

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Plenty of changes could be made to either team’s gameplan before they next tip-off but for now there have been quite a few details to breakdown for both teams gameplan.

How the LA Clippers looked

Starting with the game’s winner, the LA Clippers were led to victory off the performance of their two stars. Kawhi Leonard went off for 29 points while his acquired running-mate Paul George pitched in 24 points of his own.

The Clippers’ play went beyond just their stars, though. The Clippers who early on were viewed as championship favorites by some battled with health all season and have struggled at times in the NBA’s restart to show team chemistry.

Against the Mavericks, that wasn’t the case. Even with the loss of key contributors Patrick Beverley and Montrezl Harrell, the Clippers showed the ability to play as a unit. Most of the offense was initiated through the teams star forwards (who both led the team in assists for the game) but the team’s role players fed off the Clippers tandem better than they have all season.

Ivica Zubac scored 21 points at the ideal rim target, while forward Marcus Morris was able to play off the team’s stars as a spot-up shooter.

On the other end of the floor, the Clippers showed more strong defense. The team did a great job of slowing down the Mavericks five-out pick and roll attack with both Leonard and George using their defensive prowess to slow Mavericks’ star Luka Doncic down.

Doncic still played well but had four turnovers and not the best field goal percentage. Overall, the Clippers held the Mavs to only 17-48 from 3-point range which showcased their strong perimeter defense.

How the Dallas Mavericks looked

For Dallas, the Mavericks played a strong game but continued to show some signs of concern in Orlando. The biggest positive for the Mavericks was that their start duo of Doncic and Kristaps Porzingis continued to show their strengths as a deadly high-low combination.

Doncic was able to continue to create space at will for his own scoring 29 points while he dished to Porzingis who scored 30 points of his own in another strong game. The duo showcased that they’re able to feed off of each other and continually hit each other in their sweet spots.

What the Mavericks did miss, though, was the presence of Seth Curry who is arguably the third-best player for Dallas. Curry who was out with a leg injury was sorely missed due to his strong 3-point shooting and the pressure he takes off Doncic as a playmaker.

Though the Clippers showed that a lot of their struggles might be behind them, the Mavericks have shown that the rest of the NBA might have begun to figure the team out. The entire Dallas offense is running through Doncic and for good reason because he is already a superstar in the league, but the result has made the team predictable.

An offense that was ranked first in the NBA and was considered historically great seems to have been figured out now. Teams in Orlando have let Doncic and Porzingis go off, but then they have shut down the Mavericks surrounding shooters. This is what the Clippers did too.

Then defensively, the Mavericks showed that they don’t exactly love that end of the court. In the Mavericks three losses in Orlando, the team has given up nearly 120 points or more in each. For Dallas, they live and die by shootout games.

Was it a preview?

With the Los Angeles Lakers locking up the No. 1 seed in the West, the Clippers are essentially locked into the No. 2 spot. For Dallas, they are well ahead of the eighth seed in the West but haven’t played well enough to move up in the standings meaning it’s likely they’ll hold the seventh seed.

This means it’s likely that a Clippers/Mavericks first-round series is on the horizon. This could be a very one-sided series as the Clippers are 3-0 now against the Mavericks this season and that’s without always having their full roster available.

For the Mavericks, though, they are at least lucky enough to have plenty of footage of the Clippers and there’s still time that head coach Rick Carlisle could make enough changes to at least make a competitive series.

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Whatever happens over the next few weeks is still unknown but the Clippers and Mavericks have been one of the most interesting NBA matchups to watch all season and a first-round series could be a serious start to competitive Western Conference playoffs.