Mavericks’ Biggest Offensive Shift in the Dončić Era

How Dallas is adapting to the modern NBA pace and spacing

Photo by Sam Hodde / Getty Images

After a disappointing 5-7 start, the Dallas Mavericks have found their groove, becoming one of the hottest teams in the NBA with six straight wins and ten victories in their last eleven games. Even better, they’re finally healthy again—Dante Exum being the lone exception—with superstar Luka Dončić back in action and looking like the league’s best scorer. Since returning from his wrist injury, Dončić has posted 36- and 37-point games, followed by a triple-double in his last three outings, once again serving as the centerpiece of everything the Mavericks do offensively.

But while Dončić’s early-season struggles feel like a distant memory, the two-week stretch during which he missed five of six games deserves closer attention. In that span, the Mavericks notched five wins, including impressive victories over contenders like Oklahoma City, Denver, and New York. Without Dončić, the team played a fun, dynamic brand of basketball, with several players stepping up to shoulder the scoring and playmaking load. They showed they could do more than simply space the floor and knock down shots.

This stretch wasn’t just a hot streak—it’s a blueprint. As the Mavericks aim to address the shortcomings that held them back after their 2021-22 run to the Western Conference Finals, and even last June’s Finals loss, this period of growth could be the key to taking the next step.

But before I dive into both the past playoffs and an even more exciting look at a potential future one, let me share a couple of thoughts from Mavericks' assistant—and Jason Kidd's longtime right-hand man—Sean Sweeney, shared during a coaching clinic earlier this year in Las Vegas, that have been on my mind since the Finals ended in June.

Redefining offensive roles: A different perspective

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The modern era of basketball, defined by pace, space, and the analytics-driven shift to three-point-heavy, positionless play, challenges the very concept of traditional positions. How do you define the positions of players like Luka Dončić, Giannis Antetokounmpo, or Nikola Jokić? Are they small forwards, power forwards, centers, or rather point guards in different shapes and bodies?

Instead of focusing on positions, I’ve been thinking about offensive roles: the advantage creators who generate opportunities, the players who sustain those advantages by attacking gaps and moving the ball, and the finishers—spot-up shooters or rim-rolling bigs.

Speaking at the coaching clinic, Sweeney presented a somewhat similar classification: playmakers—players like Luka or Giannis who generate offense and create opportunities; decision-makers—players who know how to exploit rotations and understand what to do when the ball comes to them, whether initiating offense from the elbow, the top of the floor, or the post. And finally, if you can’t be either of those, you’ve got to be able to shoot—or, as I’ll add, finish the play by dunking the lob on the roll—so, shooters/finishers.

Of course, after listening to Sweeney discuss this classification, the next logical step in my thought process was to evaluate the current Mavericks roster through the lens of his offensive roles.

However, before diving into that, I want to take a step back—or perhaps two—because this distinction between offensive roles and the balance between playmaking and decision-making (or, if you prefer, advantage creators and the rest of the roster) reminded me of my analysis following the 2022 Playoffs.

Lessons from the past

The 2022 playoffs and the Western Conference finals run

Let’s flashback to 2022. The Mavericks had just closed a chapter by moving on from Kristaps Porzingis in a trade that brought in Spencer Dinwiddie and Davis Bertans. That deal signaled a full commitment to a 5-out system—spreading the floor around Luka Dončić with players who could defend and hit spot-up threes. It also added something crucial: a third ball-handler in Dinwiddie. At the time, the narrative centered on how valuable that third ball-handler was—a player who could run pick-and-rolls, create offense, or score in isolation. Dinwiddie’s presence enabled the Mavericks to always pair Dončić with another ball-handler on the floor, giving them more flexibility and offensive balance.

The Mavericks surrounded Dončić, Brunson, and Dinwiddie with 3-and-D specialists—players who could defend and hit spot-up threes—like Dorian Finney-Smith, Reggie Bullock, and Maxi Kleber. With Tim Hardaway Jr. missing the entire playoffs due to injury and Dwight Powell playing limited minutes, the Mavericks essentially ran a 6-man rotation for the majority of the playoffs.

The concept of having two additional ball-handlers (playmakers) alongside Dončić—highlighted by Brunson’s breakout as a star on the national stage and Dinwiddie’s ability to seamlessly shift between playmaking and decision-making roles—delivered the Mavericks their greatest success of the Dončić era.

The problem was that there were no other decision-makers beyond the guard trio, who controlled the ball almost exclusively, and there was a huge gap between them and the rest of the team.

The Mavericks outperformed their talent, defeating the juggernaut 64-win, number-one-seed Suns in the second round. They did it on the back of Dončić’s and Brunson’s brilliance, along with all their key wing players—Finney-Smith, Bullock, and Kleber—shooting 40 percent or better from three during the playoffs.

The team’s limitations became glaring in the Conference Finals, where they ran into a versatile Warriors squad with significantly more decision-making talent (Green, Thompson, Wiggins) supporting their top playmakers (Curry, Poole).

Other powerhouse teams, like the Celtics, already had the foundation of a roster with multiple playmaking and decision-making options. You could argue that, after being a leader and early adopter of the 5-out trend in 2019—featuring a stretch big in Porzingis and others spacing in the corners—the Mavericks fell behind as the NBA evolved into a more dynamic, dribble-drive and cut-oriented league.

The 2024 playoffs and the Finals finals run

After a lost year following Brunson’s departure, the Mavericks reshaped their roster by trading for Kyrie Irving, drafting Dereck Lively II, and making two key trade deadline moves in February to acquire P.J. Washington and Daniel Gafford. For the first time in the Dončić era, the team’s identity and path to winning—culminating in a Finals appearance—was built on defense, not an otherworldly offense.

Irving represented a significant step forward as a second option, a great alternative to Dončić as the primary playmaker, while also thriving as the ultimate decision-maker, punishing any advantage or gap created by Dončić.

P.J. Washington and Derrick Jones Jr. brought athleticism, much-needed defensive pressure, and flashes of decision-making in the OKC series. Washington punished smaller defenders in the post, forcing OKC into key adjustments, while DJJ made enough plays on the short roll. Both also shot the ball at a high clip, which ultimately decided the series. In the next round against the elite Timberwolves defense, both playmakers operated at such a high level that finishing—through Lively and Gafford lobs—was all that was needed (Gafford excels as a finisher, while Lively is much better decision-maker on the short roll).

However, in the Finals, the Mavericks faced a team with arguably the most playmaking and decision-making talent (Tatum, Brown, Holiday, White, Porzingis, Horford) since the Warriors' superteam with Curry and Durant.

If you look at the chart above, you’ll notice several Celtic-green names clustered in the top-right area, representing above-average dribble and touch rates—key indicators of decision-making. The other team that tested the Celtics’ championship defense the most featured two additional decision-makers, Nembhard and Siakam, alongside two primary playmakers, Haliburton and McConnell.

Technically speaking, there are other Mavs-blue names in that area, including Dante Exum, Jaden Hardy, and even Tim Hardaway Jr. However, all disappointed and eventually fell out of the rotation, with none averaging more than 13 minutes per game in the playoffs. The playoff demise of Exum—who had initially surprised and looked like the ultimate decision-making option—and of Josh Green, who never lived up to that potential, ultimately prevented the Mavericks from overcoming the final hurdle in the Finals. The Celtics dared anyone but Dončić or Irving to make decisions or take shots, exposing the Mavericks’ lack of shooting and dribble-drive capability to do so.

The present: The 2024-25 Mavericks