Luka Dončić shines as Mavericks close out Clippers to reach NBA’s last eight
Luka Dončić had 28 points and 13 assists, Kyrie Irving scored 28 of his 30 points in a strong second-half surge and the Dallas Mavericks advanced to the second round of the playoffs on Friday night with a 114-101 victory over the Los Angeles Clippers.
With his ailing right knee, Dončić was able to get through another tough shooting night and do what the Slovenian superstar couldn’t do three years earlier: shut down the Clippers in Dallas in Game 6 of a first-round series.
The fifth-seeded Mavericks defeated the Clippers in the first round for the first time in three tries over the past five seasons and will open the Western Conference semifinals at the top seed, Oklahoma City, on Tuesday night.
Paul George had 18 points and 11 rebounds for the Clippers, who won the first two times they played in the series without Kawhi Leonard but didn’t score enough the last two times. He was sidelined by an inflammation of the right knee.
James Harden had 16 points and 13 assists but was just 5 of 16 from the field and missed all six of his three-pointers as LA was eliminated in the first round for the second straight season.
Irving, Dončić’s co-star who was added at the trade deadline last year for the kind of playoff run the Mavs hope are just beginning, gave Dallas its biggest lead with a flashy four-point play when he hit a lopsided 3-pointer when he got bumped by P.J. Tucker and made the free throw for a 106-82 lead.
The Clippers answered with an 11-2 run to get within 13, but never seriously threatened a big comeback in the final minutes.
The Mavs broke a 52-52 halftime tie by outscoring the Clippers 35-20 in the third quarter – the same quarter that fueled Los Angeles’ Game 5 win for a chance to establish – and pushed the lead early in the fourth to 20.
Dončić, who has been dealing with illness in addition to a sore knee, started 0 of 7 from three-point range and fell below 25% for the series, but made his first attempt of the second half to cap the third quarter surge to start.
The NBA scoring champion was 9 of 26 from the field and just 1 of 10 from 3, while making 9 of 11 on free throws. Irving was 10 of 13 from the field after halftime.
Norman Powell scored 20 for the Clippers and Ivica Zubac had 17 points and 11 rebounds.
PJ Washington scored 14 points on some big three-pointers for the Mavs, going 4-of-8 from deep, and Daniel Gafford had 13 points with several emphatic buckets down low.
Dallas’ Maxi Kleber did not return after spraining his right shoulder when he fell hard after a blocking foul on Amir Coffey on a drive in the opening minute of the second quarter.
Kleber, whose three-point shooting was a boost for Dallas in the series, returned to shoot free throws and made one of two before taking off on the next dead ball.