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For this, they will rely not only on Doncic’s scoring prowess but also on his role as a distributor. In fact, few have come closer than Doncic in replicating Curry’s child-like infectious approach to the game.Īnd now with the Warriors evidently on the wane, the Mavericks will fancy themselves heir apparent to the Western Conference throne. The story – even the culture at large – isn’t unlike the one the Warriors have employed to achieve greatness for a decade. Instead, they reeled in a relatively unknown 19-year-old from Slovenia in the 2018 draft and provided the right components to turn him into one. The Mavericks might not sound as appealing on paper as the Warriors, but their culture isn’t one built on the back of one or two stars.

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Lest we forget, the Mavs won the regular-season series 3-1. More importantly, how they quell the shooting brilliance of Curry and Thompson will greatly dictate the NBA Western Conference odds going forward. In that, it’s easy to see why Doncic will make an impact. They will look to match Golden State’s energy and rotation strategy with their own version of small ball, only their point guard happens to be six-foot-seven and 230 pounds. The likes of sixth man Spencer Dinwiddie, Jalen Brunson, Dwight Powell, Reggie Bullock and Dorian Finney-Smith have powered the Mavericks to their first conference final since Dirk Nowitzky and company’s fabled championship run in 2011.īesides putting away the fancied Phoenix Suns in a blowout Game 7 victory, the Mavericks also did a number on the Utah Jazz, prompting many to believe that they have what it takes to topple the Warriors.Įvidently, Jason Kidd’s team is on a mission to defeat the bigwigs, but how they fare against the Warriors’ pace, pedigree and home-court advantage remains to be seen. While there is more than an iota of truth to the sentiment, it would be errant to ignore those giving him the cushion to be an MVP-level star. It’s tempting to ride the Luka Doncic train and assume that the weight of the franchise sits on the broad shoulders of the 23-year-old savant. Luckily for them, they have arguably the greatest shooting backcourt of this season’s NBA in Stephen Curry and Klay Thompson.Īdd to this Jordan Poole’s rise, Andrew Wiggins’ new-found consistency and Green’s world-class acumen as a playmaker, and Steve Kerr has some stability to rely on during the closing stages.īut when some of these components don’t come together, they look about as grisly as their horrid rate of turnovers.

If so, they have to rely once again on the shooters to come good.

Draymond Green was the first to admit the same in a subsequent interaction as he noticed that should the opposition fill the paint with a couple of big men, Golden State’s small-ball unit was going to have trouble rebounding on either end.

Western conference finals