The end of the Dallas Mavericks’ season marks the beginning for a few franchise-altering questions
DALLAS — ONCE AGAIN, the Dallas Mavericks changed plans during a bizarre final week of what Luka Doncic described as “a very disappointing season.”
A few days after declaring he’d play so long as the Mavs had even the slimmest of postseason hopes, the franchise announced Doncic would sit out after playing the first quarter in Friday night’s home game against the Chicago Bulls, joining co-star Kyrie Irving and four other healthy core players on the bench.
Doncic had scored 11 points in the first quarter, chuckling with fellow European and foe Nikola Vucevic on several occasions, neither taking a game both franchises preferred to lose too seriously despite the fact that a loss would eliminate the Mavs from play-in contention.
But Doncic trotted back out onto the American Airlines Center court to open the second quarter. After going through the motions on a defensive possession, Doncic posted up on the right block, made a spin move and drove to the basket, pump-faking before laying the ball in for his 719th bucket of the season.
Seconds later, Doncic committed an intentional foul and checked out of the game, his season over, barring another sudden shift in the franchise’s strategy.
The intention was for Doncic to be showered with a standing ovation by the sellout crowd on “I Feel Slovenia” night as he walked off the court. That didn’t happen. Instead, there was a smattering of confused clapping.
It was an awkwardly fitting unofficial ending to a season in which nothing has unfolded as envisioned for the Mavericks, who took less than two months to morph from buzzing about a blockbuster trade — a risky win-now move considering Irving’s pending free agent status, among other factors — to blatantly tanking in the regular season’s final week.
The Mavs broke a tie with the Bulls in the lottery standings with the loss, standing alone with the 10th-best odds with one game remaining in the regular season. That’s a critically important distinction for Dallas, which owes the New York Knicks a top-10-protected pick as the final payment for the Kristaps Porzingis trade.
“It’s not so much waving the white flag,” coach Jason Kidd said after the 115-112 loss to the Bulls, attributing the call to essentially pull the plug to Mavs governor Mark Cuban and general manager Nico Harrison.
“Decisions sometimes are hard in this business, and you have to make hard decisions. We’re trying to build a championship team, and sometimes you got to take a step back.
“Understanding with this decision, this is maybe a step back, but hopefully it leads to going forward.”
There’s a strong sense of urgency within the organization to expedite the process before Doncic loses faith in the Mavs’ ability to build a contender around him. He’s wrapping up the first season of a five-year, $215 million supermax contract with a player option for the final season.
Team sources have acknowledged to ESPN that fear exists that Doncic, who publicly and privately expressed extreme frustration this season, could consider requesting a trade as soon as the summer of 2024 if Dallas doesn’t make significant progress by then.
“He’d like to be here the whole time,” Cuban said this week when asked about Doncic’s long-term optimism. “But we’ve got to earn that.