Luka Doncic of the Dallas Mavericks and Shai Gilgeous-Alexander of the Oklahoma City Thunder are among the NBA’s brightest stars. Both finished in the top three of Most Valuable Player voting last season, with Gilgeous-Alexander finishing second and Doncic third.
On Tuesday, the Mavericks and host Thunder square off in the first round of the NBA Cup’s knockout stage.
The game is a rematch of last season’s second-round playoff series, which Dallas won 4-2.
Doncic has been particularly hot since returning from a right wrist sprain that kept him out five games in late November. In four games since his return, Doncic is averaging 31.0 points, 10.5 rebounds and 9.5 assists per game.
Doncic comes into Tuesday’s game with two consecutive triple-doubles.
In Saturday’s win at the Toronto Raptors, Doncic had 30 points, 13 rebounds and 11 assists to move past Wilt Chamberlain and James Harden and into seventh on the NBA’s all-time triple-double list with 79.
“When you talk about his skill set, filling up the stat sheet, he’s had two here, he can run them off,” Dallas coach Jason Kidd said of Doncic. “We always expect him to have a triple-double, or we sometimes take him for granted for triple-doubles. I think right now you can see that he’s starting to get into a groove.”
In last season’s playoff matchup, Gilgeous-Alexander averaged 32.2 points, 8.0 rebounds and 7.3 assists. Doncic averaged 24.7 points, 10.5 rebounds and 8.7 assists, with a triple-double in each of the final three games of the series.
Gilgeous-Alexander has scored at least 30 points in six of his past seven games this season.
Oklahoma City has won seven of its past eight games, including three consecutive, while the Mavericks enter the contest as the NBA’s hottest team with seven straight wins.
Tuesday’s game, which also counts in the regular-season standings, will be the second between the teams this season.
Doncic missed the Mavericks’ 121-119 win on Nov. 17 in Oklahoma City with a bruised right knee. P.J. Washington had 27 points and a career-high 17 rebounds in that game for Dallas.
That tight game has become the norm for the series as of late, as six of the past nine regular-season meetings between the teams have been decided by single digits.
The first meeting of the season was one of the Thunder’s last without Isaiah Hartenstein, a 7-footer who missed the first 15 games of the campaign with a fracture in his hand.
In eight games since returning, Hartenstein has helped Oklahoma City adjust to the loss of Chet Holmgren. Hartenstein is averaging 11.8 points, 12.8 rebounds and 4.5 assists. He’s never averaged more than 2.5 assists per game in any of his first six NBA seasons.
“He’s a phenomenal passer,” teammate Alex Caruso said of Hartenstein. “People don’t talk about him as a passer as a big in the league. Obviously (Denver’s Nikola) Jokic is in a category of his own. That’s a different guy.”
For the Mavericks, Washington and Naji Marshall are questionable for Tuesday’s game due to illnesses, while Jaden Hardy (right ankle sprain) and Maxi Kleber (illness) are out.
Washington was the only one of the four to play in Saturday’s win against Toronto.
–Field Level Media
