By Eurohoops Team/ info@eurohoops.net
Things didn’t look good. The Dallas Mavericks lost Game 4 at home, with Luka Doncic having serious knee issues throughout the match.
However, the Slovenian star clenched his teeth and delivered another performance to remember, dominating at Crypto.com Arena and pushing the Clippers to the brink of elimination. All of that through knee problems and a solid case of a cold.
“I was trying not to think of the injury and the cold, just trying to set the tone,” Luka said. “It’s tough; you can’t breathe through the nose, so I had to blow my nose all the time. But it was an adrenaline of the playoff game, a big one, so I knew I needed to be locked in 100 percent.”
The knee is not improving, but Doncic can’t stop now.
“We’ll see; it’s worse after the game, but I’ll do everything I can to be ready to go. It’s not really good, but once you get started, you want to do everything to help your team win.”
He also praised Maxi Kleber, who was the second-best scorer of the Mavs with 15 points.
“We created a lot of open shots; Maxi knocked down three in a row, so that helped. The bench was in the game the whole time, and Maxi was big today, hitting big shots.”
Luka dominated despite shooting 2/8 from beyond the arc. He, therefore, scored 20 points in the paint and made 12 out of his 18 attempts inside the arc.
“Obviously, my shooting is not great. Not even good. Very bad, actually. I was just getting downhill. The first four threes I took felt great; they just didn’t go in, but my whole mentality was just getting downhill.”
Doncic also played solid defense, which he was heavily criticized for after the Game 4 loss. Apparently, the Clippers were 3/12 from the floor when Luka was the primary defender in the Game 5 victory.
“I always speak on his resilience. He’s not feeling a hundred percent, but he’s still going to go out there and play. As a teammate, I enjoy that. I enjoy being around somebody like that who’s going to push themselves but also be smart and still make an impact on the game — and still empty his clips, as we like to say. Even though he is not feeling well or he’s not able to be a hundred percent, he’s still able to lead our team in his own way.”
In the end, the Slovenian had his fifth 30-point, 10-assist postseason performance. He scored or assisted on 61 of the Mavs’ 123 points.
“We knew at some point Luka was going to have a Luka game,” Clippers coach Tyronn Lue said. “We’re not going to hang our heads. We got to win four games. We go to Dallas, Game 6 on Friday, and we’ll be ready to go.“