No Composure, Identity Lost, New Lows Reached

Mavs Game Observations: Game 12 @ Jazz

Photo by Aaron Ontiveroz

The 2024-25 Dallas Mavericks are making us doubt and rethink everything. Their championship aspirations. My 55-win, best regular season in the Dončić era prediction. Even the structure of these post-game observations.

After the clutch collapse against Steph Curry and the Golden State Warriors, game notes turned into a column dissecting clutch breakdowns and the (lack of) process behind them.

After yet another disappointment—following the exact same blueprint of a lazy start, digging a hole, mounting a comeback, only to fall apart in the clutch again—today’s game notes have become a reflection on a team that has lost its identity.

I typically don’t overreact to bad losses, but this one is different. The lack of response after several disappointments, losing to one of the worst teams in the league, and yet another total breakdown reveal deeper cracks than just bad luck in the clutch. It’s especially concerning for a team with championship aspirations and the expectations that come with them.

But then again, this is the NBA—where a month and a winning streak can make us forget all of this.

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Today’s notes:

1. Lack of identity

2. Lack of plan

3. Lack of composure and leadership

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1-Lack of identity

Last year’s team was so fun to watch because the Mavericks had a clear identity: an athletic, defensive-minded team that played hard every night, made opponents second-guess every attempt at attacking the paint, and leaned on the dominance of two superstars on offense.

This season, one of the stars is struggling to find his dominant form, surrounded by question marks all around. Probably, the latter part crystallizes once the first part falls back into place. Or maybe it’s the other way around—it’s hard to tell right now. What’s clear is that the Mavericks are searching for that DNA (or perhaps a different one?) that was the foundation of their Finals run. Last night was a perfect example of the questions that still remain unanswered.

Is this a defensive-minded team or an offensive one? Do we play big, or do we outrun and outgun you by going small?

The starting lineup reshuffle hinted at a return to last year’s winning formula—starting Lively and Kleber, going big, and focusing on protecting the paint. It went to extremes early, with Dwight Powell even playing as a power forward in the first quarter. Then, late in the third, we saw a complete U-turn to the other end of the spectrum—a lineup featuring an undersized Powell at center, surrounded by four guards: Dončić, Hardy, Grimes, and Dinwiddie. As the game progressed, Jason Kidd leaned more towards smaller lineups and the Mavericks got destroyed on the glass again.

Is this a Luka-centric offense, or do we spread the touches? Do we push the pace, or do we methodically dissect teams in the half-court?

Luka's touches are one of the early-season talking points, and last night, a more balanced distribution might have cost the Mavericks their second consecutive game. The Mavericks committed 17 turnovers against a poor defensive team. Thompson, Marshall, and Hardy each had three, while Dinwiddie added two. Most of these came from forcing the pace—driving into traffic or making reckless passes—or from trying to create on-ball in the half-court. Marshall posted a 22% usage rate, Thompson’s even climbed to 30%.

Ball control has always been a building block of the Mavs' offense (top 5 in turnover rate in each of the last six seasons), so reverting back to more Dončić control seems like a safe bet. However, we also saw the potential pitfalls of that approach down the stretch when Dončić isn’t at his peak, alongside glimpses of the upside that additional ball-handlers can bring—like Marshall’s impressive fourth quarter flury.

Who is the third ball-handler and creator? Who’s starting, and who’s closing?

Who’s going to be the first playamker off the bench was one of key questions heading into training camp, and it always gets exposed when either Dončić or Irving misses a game. Will the ball be in Hardy’s, Thompson’s, Marshall’s, or Dinwiddie’s hands? None from this group seems to have Kidd’s full trust and consequently the confidence to step up.

And while the team’s depth has been widely praised, the reality that only two players have Kidd’s trust to both start and close games highlights just how much this team is still searching for its identity.

Lack of plan

It seems that the lack of clear structure, and vision for how to play on both ends accumulates into a lack of a execution—or trust in the plan—down the stretch.

Against the Warriors, the Mavericks got put to sleep by Steph Curry, with players not looking confident—either in what the plan was (seemingly to switch Luka or the bigs onto Curry) or in their ability to execute it.

Last night, there were several moments of confusion and defensive breakdowns throughout the game: failing to defend Utah’s bigs on straight-line drives, failing to switch properly on high guard screens and giving up open threes, and bigs not providing help on Clarkson’s iso drives into the paint. And, of course, the most glaring breakdown came on the final defensive possession, with Dončić and Grimes looking to the bench for a signal on whether or when to double Clarkson, which led to Dončić getting caught lost in space and resulted in a Collins dunk.

Lack of composure and leadership

That final breakdown wasn’t the only one down the stretch. Utah scored on two earlier possessions, the first with Mavs up by two and one minute and twenty seconds left—a Clarkson isolation drive past Grimes that resulted in an and-one at the rim. Lively, unsure, hesitated and looked toward the bench after merely stunting instead of providing help on the drive. On the next possession, the Mavs gave up a Luka switch against Clarkson. This time, Lively stepped up to help and got a piece of Clarkson's shot, but it left Collins wide open to grab an uncontested rebound and put back the miss, with Grimes stuck in the corner.

Getting burned by a Curry step-back three hurts, but it happens—even to better defensive teams than Dallas right now. Getting scored on three consecutive times in the final minute and a half by a Jordan Clarkson-led, lowly Jazz team is a different story altogether.

This was Dončić's worst defensive game of the season—a letdown in a year where he’s often been one of the Mavericks’ better defenders. It was also one of those games where he visibly battled the fire and rage burning inside. The same fire that gives him the confidence to take and make a stare-down three with two minutes left, despite hitting only one of his previous ten attempts, is also the one that causes him to lose composure on critical defensive possessions.

Losing composure down the stretch looks even worse considering the Mavericks fought like hell to claw their way back into the game after a similar collapse at the end of the third quarter, which resulted in a 14-point deficit heading into the fourth. A stretch during which the experienced Mavericks—not the baby-faced Jazz—looked like the naïve, helter-skelter team. In a six-minute span, Hardy (twice), Marshall, and Dinwiddie committed four turnovers, all stemming from reckless drives or ill-advised passes on the move. It was also a stretch that saw Thompson’s layup attempt get blocked, Collins soaring over Gafford for a putback, and Marshall throwing a play-initiating pass into Gafford’s back while the big man was looking the other way.

These kinds of mistakes can’t happen to a team that isn’t hiding its title aspirations. There’s still enough time for a turnaround, but things need to change. The leaders of this team must take accountability and pull the wagon out of the mud—mud they let it slip into in the first place.