Mavs Playbook: Diagonal Down Series

A quick hitter out of a timeout to reward the big man with a shot near the basket

Photo by Sam Hodde / Getty Images

This is a quick hitter play, so I’ll be brief too. The Mavericks ran this play in last night's win over the Chicago Bulls to open up the second quarter. It’s one of those go-to sets Jason Kidd calls when he’s looking to get his big man a high-percentage shot close to the basket.

Welcome back to the Mavs Playbook series, where we’re breaking down the X's and O's to dig deeper into Mavericks’ games. This is the third play we’ll be analyzing in the series, adding another tactical layer to the Analytics Guides, Game Coverage, and Player Profiles, giving digginbasketball readers a fuller, more rounded understanding of Mavericks basketball.

For these play breakdowns, I’m collaborating with my X's and O's mentor, Luka Bassin. Luka is a former player, scout, and assistant for the Slovenian national team with an extensive background in player development and play analysis. His expertise—and his database of thousands of plays on Coachtube—help bring a sharper view into the strategic side of the game.

Diagonal Down Series - a set of options to reward the big man with a look at the rim

In an offense dominated by two extraordinary ball handlers like Luka Dončić and Kyrie Irving, the Mavericks’ big men rarely get plays called specifically for them. The primary job for guys like Dereck Lively II and Daniel Gafford is to protect the paint, run the floor, set hard screens, and be a vertical threat at the rim.