After a wild ups and downs, including an overtime drama, the Los Angeles Lakers take their fourth consecutive victory over Dallas Mavericks. Dallas finds no way to stop the domination of the guests in the zone – Dirk Nowitzki also has a pitch black evening.
With the self-confidence from three victories in a row, the Lakers entered the duel with the Mavs – and this self-confidence was evident in the first quarter. The guests from the City of Angels got off to a much better start and won the first round 31:20.
The only drawback was the injury of Brandon Ingram, who injured his ankle. The Big Man came back to the scene for a short time, but a little later it was clear: Ingram was not able to continue this evening. At the same time, the engine started to stutter a little bit with his team-mates. The Mavericks held the visitors at just 15 points and beat them back (32:15).
An important role was played by Dennis Smith Jr. The rookie was the best scorer of the Mavs with 23 points, he was supported by Harrison Barnes (17) and Wesley Matthews (17). As in the last game Maxi Kleber came against Hornets von der Bank, but was only allowed to play for 1 minute and could not set accents.
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The latter also applied to Dirk Nowitzki. The tall blonde had to fight with his litter all night long (6 points, 1/7 FG, 8 rebounds). Nowitzki scored his first successful field goal at the beginning of the fourth quarter. With his threesome he put the Mavs in front with 10 points, but the Lakers did not meet anything offensively in this phase: Twelve throws in succession of the guests in purple and gold only landed on the ring.
However, this was by no means a preliminary decision in this thrilling game. The Lakers were led by Jordan Clarkson (19 points, 11 of them in the second half) and started several races in the final minutes. Thanks to some clutch shots of Smith and above all Barnes, the Mavericks got into overtime.
But at the latest there was the supremacy of the Lakers in the zone too much. Julius Randle in particular scored 23 points (9/15 FG) and 15 rebounds (but also 7 ball losses). Kyle Kuzma also got a good evening with 18 points and 10 rebounds, so that L. A. clearly under the ring. The Lakers scored 54 points in the Zone, Dallas just 30 (Rebounds: 59:39 for L. A.).
From a Mavs point of view, it was anything but spectacular (11/43 threesomes, 25.6 percent), so that the hosts didn’t have much to confront the Lakers in the overtime any more. Not surprisingly, it was an offensive rebound by Randle, who made the bag in favor of the Lakers. Los Angeles celebrated their longest winning streak of the season with four consecutive successes.