Playoffs Round Two (5) Dallas vs (1) Oklahoma City

[Clav]

Series schedule

Here’s how to watch the Mavericks vs. Thunder series:

All times Eastern Standard Time

Game 1: Mavericks vs. Thunder, Tuesday, May 7 (9:30 p.m., TNT)
Game 2: Mavericks vs. Thunder, Thursday, May 9 (9:30 p.m., ESPN)
Game 3: Thunder vs. Mavericks, Saturday, May 11 (3:30 p.m., ABC)
Game 4: Thunder vs. Mavericks, Monday, May 13 (9:30 p.m., TNT)
Game 5: Mavericks vs. Thunder, Wednesday, May 15 (TBD, TNT) *
Game 6: Thunder vs. Mavericks, Saturday, May 18 (8:30 p.m. ET, ESPN) *
Game 7: Mavericks vs. Thunder, Monday, May 20 (8:30 p.m. ET, TNT) *
* = If necessary


OKC up 3-1 on the RS series...but that's not necessarily indicative of the way this will play out.

OKC played Dallas early before they had the trade with Gafford and Washington Jr.

After the trade, Luka didn't play 2 games - including the season finale where OKC beat Dallas by a lot and neither Kyrie or Luka played that game.

However, Doncic is kind of ailing with a knee sprain, so this series could be included with a lot of variables.... such as... will Dallas be able to remain healthy ? Will the rebounding advantage play out in Mavs favour and strike the Thunder down ? Vet experience with Kyrie and Luka - both have ample playoff experience and a good front line ...but Mavs missing Hardaway Jr for some time yet.

Meanwhile the rested OKC team has a lot of speed and playmaking, played well in round 1 and no big injuries. Dallas is not known for defensive prowess but shut down the dangerous Clippers for stretches. Even so - the Clips had injury issues and inconsistency rise up. This should be a worthy series, I'm looking forward to it!

[ThunderWins]

No Herb SGA is going cook the Mavs.
The extra rest should be good for Chet hopefully unlocking the reliable pick and pop.
Dallas bigs will struggle to stay on the floor if this happens.
More important we need Chet to protect the paint better than the Clippers bigs did.

Not sure why Lou didn't quickly abandon the Westbrook + Plumlee minutes
Hopefully Giddey contributes or Mark is prepared to sub out quickly if he can't make them pay for doubling off.

Irving appears to start cooking in the second half so depending on how the matchups are going it might be good idea to rotate Dort to him. If Jdubb could at least slow Irving down that might be enough.

Thunder offense needs to pop off more in this series than it did against the Pelicans.
All in all if they play solid consistent defense like they did in Pelicans series it should be over quick.

Thunder in 4 sweep.

[Clav]

No Herb SGA is going cook the Mavs.
The extra rest should be good for Chet hopefully unlocking the reliable pick and pop.
Dallas bigs will struggle to stay on the floor if this happens.
More important we need Chet to protect the paint better than the Clippers bigs did.

Not sure why Lou didn't quickly abandon the Westbrook + Plumlee minutes
Hopefully Giddey contributes or Mark is prepared to sub out quickly if he can't make them pay for doubling off.

Irving appears to start cooking in the second half so depending on how the matchups are going it might be good idea to rotate Dort to him. If Jdubb could at least slow Irving down that might be enough.

Thunder offense needs to pop off more in this series than it did against the Pelicans.
All in all if they play solid consistent defense like they did in Pelicans series it should be over quick.

Thunder in 4 sweep.

Welcome to the forums!

I like your optimism. I hope you're right because I am far less optimistic

[ThunderWins]

Like Dort said said "We got more!"

The pressure is high on Dallas since they mortgaged their future.
2025 1st goes to Knicks 11-30 probably will convey
2026 1st THE ONLY FIRST they control
2027 1st goes to Charlotte top 2 protected
2028 1st OKC right to swap no protections (sly dog Presti gambling that maybe Luka leaves and the mavs rebuild)
2029 1st to Brooklyn no protection
2030 1st SAS right to swap
In the old CBA filling in a roster without planning after the fact was possible but now if they choose to be second apron team from 2024 on improving will be difficult.
Many teams will be filling out the roster spots with 2nd rounders and vet minimums as they don't have mid-level exception and can't sign players in the buyout market.

its great for Dallas that Irving is playing well. At 32 he's only 2 years younger than Harden.
Dallas really needed to draft another young star to pair with Doncic
If Dallas doesn't win this year the Thunder and the West in general will only get significantly better.

[ThunderWins]

We haven't seen MVP level Shai for a good month
Those 2 weeks of recovery around 4 games will really help.
Don't be surprised when father Shai goes nuclear!

For all the hype of Luka Kyrie one man has been overlooked by most media and fans -
The King In The Fourth

Watch on YouTube

https://youtu.be/JSwQ98ynjQ4?si=K3bVwFKOqn-_z48s&t=156

There's really no way to account for a three level player JDub. Shoots well from midrange and three.
Passes the ball well. Can create shots for himself or any of the other shooters on the court.
He's like a mini Dort on defense.

[ThunderCeltic]

Ticketmaster also restricted Tickets to people in Oklahoma/Kansas/Arkansas/parts of Missouri. We don't want Paycom overrun with the Dallas crowd.

[ThunderWins]

Major injury news

Read on Twitter

Quote a mav fan

Ppl are going realize just how much flexibility a 6’10” guy who can defend 1-5 brought to our team. Our small ball lineup is going to very small now.

man went 10-18 from 3… we have no way to replace that production on offense AND defense…

He's been their most consistent 3 point shooter and somebody that could punish small guard lineups.

The only team that can beat this Thunder team is the Thunder!
Let's get this 5 man out motion offense in rhythm and flowing like water.
They can't guard us when we shoot our season averages!

[Clav]

The loss of Kleber is big. He's an excellent release valve for 3's because he always gets looks. He rebounds tough and plays solid D overall, he's definitely not run off the court defensively.

Hardaway is coming back and his offensive presence is needed for Dallas to win but Mavs fans have a hot/cold relationship with his streaky games.

[ThunderWins]

I still can't believe the odds makers only had Thunder are 3.5-point favorites.
I was at the game and I felt Thunder didn't play particular well yet still led a bit at half.
Oddly enough it felt like Aaron Wiggins was the X-factor providing a good bit of scoring punch from the bench.
The third quarter started off poorly and the Mavs were able to get the lead back down to 1.
Then it was like switch was flipped and boom 3 after 3 after 3.
It had to be demoralizing for Mavs fans.

Its sad Luka isn't healthy playing like he did during the regular season. I had Thunder in 4 before the series started.
There was nothing I saw against the Clippers series that made me think the Mavs would fare better against a young rested Thunder.

Before the series began we kept hearing that the bigger Mavs would control the boards and the paint as they had massive advantage.
The Thunder were scrappy and scooped up the rebounds winning that battle 52 39.
I know its only one game but I just don't see how the Mavs win if they they don't win the rebound battle, Luka + Kyrie have monster games, don't turn over the ball much and the Thunder have a bad shooting game.

[ThunderWins]

https://www.theringer.com/nba/2024/5/8/24151960/okc-thunder-western-conference-playoffs

The reality: Nobody this young has ever won before because nobody this young has ever been this good before.

And the current Thunder, with Gilgeous-Alexander and Chet Holmgren and Jalen Williams, are much better than any of the three teams on that bullet-pointed list. The 2023-24 Thunder won 57 games with a plus-7.4 point differential. The second-best under-24 team in NBA history was the 2010-11 Thunder, who won 55 games with a plus-3.8 point differential. The records are close, but the current Thunder team has a point differential that is essentially double that of the previous edition.

The reality: Rebounding is overrated—and the Thunder aren’t that terrible, anyway.

After the All-Star break, they ranked 12th in defensive rebounding rate, per CtG, and in the first round of the playoffs, they ranked a respectable 10th out of 16 teams. Fun fact: Dallas had a lower defensive rebounding rate in the first round than OKC did. And in Game 1 on Tuesday, the Thunder grabbed 16 offensive rebounds, compared to the Mavericks’ 11.

The reality: Mark Daigneault isn’t afraid to adjust.
And in Game 1 against Dallas, Giddey played only 17 minutes, fewer than Cason Wallace (23) and Aaron Wiggins (23) and slightly more than Isaiah Joe (15). The Thunder went on several big runs with Giddey on the bench; single-game plus-minus isn’t a reliable stat, but it sure confirms my priors that Giddey was the only Thunder player with double-digit minutes who had a negative on-court differential in the game.

Read on Twitter

[Clav]

Tough loss tonight, what's the root cause ? Well, Luka is great. And other players on our team looked like they had some pressure. A poor game here and there is okay, but we need better effort overall, and better execution on the offense to match Dallas' shotmaking. We cannot bank that they will be hurt or ailing, they will fight for the series to the end...

[ThunderWins]

All the media BS saying Mavs were the clutch team didn't play out as they expected in G4.
Thank goodness Chet is staying out of foul trouble and terrorizing Mavs drives to the basket.
I suspect Thunder give us a much better game 5 and we finish it out in Dallas.

[Clav]

All the media BS saying Mavs were the clutch team didn't play out as they expected in G4.
Thank goodness Chet is staying out of foul trouble and terrorizing Mavs drives to the basket.
I suspect Thunder give us a much better game 5 and we finish it out in Dallas.

I'm hoping for the same result here. Some major keys for us are to keep composure with foul calls and to continue to hunt shots with advantages. Lively II and Gafford have been incredible at blocking shots yet we still found ways to hit big ones when it counted near the paint. If we can get a couple more open looks rather than forcing a tough contested shot with the two Cs near that will pay dividends for us.