No Porzingis, No Problem.

No Porzingis, No Problem.

they say a series hasn’t started until a team wins a game on the road well with game three in Dallas and porzingis out with an injury the stars were perfectly aligned for the Mavs to defend their home court and they came out looking to do exactly that Kyrie opened the game strong blowing right by holiday on a drive with nobody to help at the rim and Luca did the same of course the Celtics are still switching every action so he can hunt for the matchup he wants to isolate as he gets that signature step back three when holiday’s on him he’s got a size Advantage so instead of falling back on the jump shot he’s going to force his way to the paint for a big body finish this next one starts with a baseline out of bounds play they set up some decoy screening action in the corner to free up the paint and Kyrie goes to a jump hook with the off hand so the start of this game was basically these two just taking turns cooking Luca gets the Tatum switch everybody stays home so he’s is able to easily get into the lane for two then Kyrie gets Horford and same thing an easy drive with no help as he shows off his touch as a finisher and this really felt like the best stretch of basketball this Duo has played in the series spamming clear out isolations as these Elite creators go to work and getting whatever they want inside the ark as for the other side of the ball the Celtics are always going to stick to their game plan that of course means get into the defense move the ball around around and hunt for the best possible shot the Mavs have had no answer for dribble penetration and against five out spacing they’re forced to give up a lot of quality threes Al Horford hits this one from the corner but interestingly enough they haven’t had one of those unconscious shooting nights yet which again looked to be the case in this one as they missed a few early most of these are practice jumpers collapsing the defense and finding the open man and like they say it’s a make or Miss League but I do think there were a few times where they let the defense off the hook like here Jaylen gets the Cross Match he wants with a full shot clock and pulls up in semi- transition their offense is always at its best when they’re generating paint touches and one way they like to do that is by using Tatum as a screener to force mismatches this switch isn’t executed in time so he’s got a lane to attack in the short roll that wasn’t the story of these first few minutes though as you can see right here the Mavs had 16 points in the paint to the Celtics 4 and when Jaylen gets matched up with Kyrie and tries to force the issue he gets called for a traveling violation right about now is when Chris Taps would typically check in but with his injury it’s instead Xavier Tilman Lively does an incredible job of slipping the screen to counter a soft switch and all of a sudden it seems a bit easier to score at The Rim with this being Tillman’s first time in the series that meant a new matchup for Luca and Kyrie to attack and this pullup jumper right here actually marked his first made three of the finals with that said the reason they went to Tilman and not cornette is because they’re comfortable with him defending in space like this so in many ways he fills right in for Al Horford well on defense that is because he isn’t much of a shooting threat the Mavs can do what they do best on defense and that’s shrink the floor they immediately go to a Zone with the idea of limiting that dribble penetration and guess who pull-up jumper fin finally decides to show up when Jaylen gets the ball you can see how much emphasis they’re placing on not giving up drives Hardy is sitting in a gap Lively’s under the basket with Tilman and Lucas sagging off with a few feet of space Jaylen again settles for the three and it doesn’t drop a play later it’s pretty much the exact same thing Lively’s pre- rotated to protect the paint leaving Tilman on an island while Jaylen comes off a screen from White Kyrie’s expecting a switch but when it doesn’t happen and he jumps out to contest and sends him to the line about a minute later it looks like he might try another one in early offense only to move it over to Tatum who steps into a three of his own with some assistance from the rim that’s two threes and you definitely don’t want him heating up so next time he touches the ball it’s a real hard close out which he attacks on a drive as he draws a foul down low this next play is just a complete breakdown jaylen’s getting ready to hunt for the Lucas switch when Hower starts running Baseline and nobody pays attention from there CBA is forced to commit to the shot and with a fly by the Sharpshooters got all the time in the world actually I want to focus on Hower when he checked into the game the Mavs made an effort to pick on him defensively and not only did he hold up he played a key part in multiple stops on this one he’s matched up with Kyrie slides his feet to shut off a drive sticks with some changes of Direction and gets a hand up to make it a tough long two a play later it’s Luca who he has to defend and notice how Jaylen has sunk way over from the wing to protect the nail not only does he recover to his man he blocks the three that’s not to say Hower checked in and started playing like Defensive Player of the Year Kawai just that he wasn’t an obvious weak link even when luuk is able to create a shot he likes it’s not at all an easy opportunity and really that applies to most of the isolations in this series you know Luca is going to make some tough shots and he’s going to pull off moves like this but that’s way better than giving up a layup not just that he finds himself on the ground which means the Celtics can push the pace with numbers as who else but Sam Hower Trails the play for a triple the final possession is basically Deja Vu Luca isolates from the right wing steps back for a tough three falls to the court and nobody else runs to get back on defense after white grabs the board so Tatum’s all alone on the other end and for easy points a quick five-point swing that brings the deficit down to one to start the second it was Payton Pritchard who pretty much did what Hower was doing defensively the Mavs view him as a weak link to pick on and he’s playing some truly impressive defense against world class shot creators of course we’re talking about alltime bucket Getters so even when Pritchard does a good job sometimes the offense is a little bit better but sometimes it isn’t like here when Luca fails to get the step on Horford and tries to throw a lob that goes straight off the rim unfortunately that was the story for Luca in this quarter as I said the shot diet is really tough and at times that can lead to cold stretches shooting just two of seven in the second but it wasn’t all self-inflicted credit to the Celtics defense Luca gets the Tillman switch and beats him off the dribble only for the big man to recover with a block from behind I can’t say enough good things about his 11 minutes of play just look at him moving his feet against Kyrie you can’t ask for better defense from your back of big on offense they went cold themselves though they shot just four of 14 from three in the second many of which were once again quality looks and when they tried to force the issue inside well they couldn’t get that going either so nearly 6 minutes in the two teams had only scored a combined seven points that’s when Kyrie decided to take over and like Jaylen Brown said after the game we were about to witness a vintage performance he’s still looking to go one-on-one with Pritchard and when he gets the step on a drive he counters help with this hanging drop off pass to Gafford down low next time it’s going to be Hower who he isolates notice how the Celtics have Shrunk the floor with holiday sitting in a driving lane and Kyrie counters by creating separation with a side step and knocking down a triple there isn’t a Defender who’s immune to that s side step holidays all over him on this one and that’s just a master of his craft going to work once Kyrie got going Luca decided that he’d add fuel to the fire and the Mavs offense really started to roll like in the start of the game there’s just one problem they couldn’t pull away because the Celtics were doing the same we know that Dallas is going to soft switch all screens and Tatum uses that space to pull up for another three the Mavs also decided to give Tim Hardaway Jr some minutes which meant another mismatch for the wings to attack but remember with Tilman on the floor Gafford can comfortably rotate to the pain that’s just high level slashing from Tatum in addition to the weaker perimeter players Boston’s been hunting for the big in the situations and on this one Luca is just completely asleep so Tatum quickly moves it to Hower who’s still feeling it from outside I know I said they went cold in this quarter but it felt like they hit the timely ones like in transition Horford knocks one down from the corner to tie it up at 48 then it’s PJ Washington who immediately responds on the other end taking a page out of Luca’s book with the Look Away pass to free up Lively at The Rim but a play later he tries to attack the pain again this time without as much success and the Celtics use that turnover to start some transition offense as Tatum gets an easy lay to tie the game at 50 then just like at the end of the first Luca decides he’s going to try some more stepback shooting but instead of leading in to offense for Boston PJ’s able to grab the offensive rebound before attacking an open Lane and drawing a foul so by the time all of this madness is over the Mavs end up with a one-point lead heading into the break to start the third everything stayed about the same for Dallas like clockwork Luca gets a switch plays one-on-one and works his way to a quality shot and Kyrie follows suit although when his layup misses gafford’s right there on the follow at one point they even took some inspiration from Boston with everyone driving and kicking to attack the rotating defense and with a packed paint Kyrie decides to stop short for a floater however I’m not sure if the Celtics turned up the game sliders or something but they just simply stopped missing shots I talked about how they’ve consistently gotten quality looks well that’s never been more prominent here’s a great example of that driving and kicking until they get a layup and next time down they’re going to use Tatum as a screener to get the switch switch on to Kyrie he seals position in the middle Gafford has to worry about a shooter and that leads to easy points jayen stopped settling so now when he’s got the Kyrie match up he’s attacking with aggression as he gets to a floater then they’re going to go back to using Tatum as a screener remember how Tatum’s pull-up jumper countered a soft switch earlier well holiday can do that as well everyone was involved and nobody was missing when Jaylen draws two it’s Tatum who gets a quality look from three when Tatum sets up for an isolation and the Defense loads up it’s Jaylen who frees up on a cut and as I mentioned earlier with Hardaway on the floor that’s a third mismatch for them to attack so the defense shifts towards Tatum in the post and from there all they have to do is move the ball around the perimeter until it finds Jaylen in the corner for a three speaking of Hardway when he tries to attack the rim in transition he gets denied by white to which the Celtics immediately start some fast break offense of their own holiday finds a streaking Tatum on his way to a dunk that probably should have resulted in a three-point play the whole idea of getting Tim on the floor in the first place was to get more outside shooting and that completely backfired as a team they attempted two threes in the third the effect of that is only magnified by the fact that Kyrie started to miss some of the shots he was hitting in the first half and those are the two variables that have really capped this offense thankfully they still had Luca’s creation to fall back on as he takes Tillman one-on-one for a tough finish well not quite because as I keep going back to tilman’s more than capable of handling these situations blocking Luca’s next attempt I also keep going back to how Tilman on the floor makes their five out less effective so when Jaylen drives his man is comfortable leaving him open to which he responds by knocking down a corner three and while we’re on the topic of unlikely makes Derek White did this just a couple minutes later which takes us to the end of the quarter and back to what the Celtics have been doing every game put Luca in action to hunt for a switch but he defends the wrong side of the screen so Jaylen has a red carpet to the basket where he takes off for a big time slam they win the quarter by 16 points and now lead by 15 with 12 minutes to go and their run didn’t stop there Tatum gets the big on a switch drives and kicks it to the corner while Kyrie has absolutely zero idea where the ball went that’s an easy triple for Jaylen then white does the exact same thing just a moment later giving the Celtics a 21-point lead with that said they sort of started to collapse a little bit and it was a result of self-inflicted wounds what I mean by that is they completely went away from what’s been working Tatum has Luca on him the matchup they’ve been exploiting for 11 quarters now and the Celtics and instead have Pritchard trying to create space against PJ Washington then Tatum gets Kyrie on him and they do attack it but instead of getting downhill he settles for an awkward mid-range jumper next time down Jaylen has Luca but again they decide to go at Washington Tatum doesn’t get a clean driving lane and the result is a turnover when they go back to what works Luca on one of the Star Wings in the middle of the floor that’s when they immediately score their first field goal in over 3 minutes but the key is to put pressure on the paint and Luca continues to Sag off of Jaylen who plays right into the defense’s hands with these pull-up threes as for the Mavs offense this was their weirdest and most unlikely run of the series because For the First Time Kyrie was cold Luca was cold but it was all of the other guys who showed up to push the offense forward when Luca tries a jumper and leaves it short Lively’s right there for a putback all series long the Celtics have been bringing help from up top and conceding above the break threes finally Josh green makes them pay for leaving him open really I want to give a lot of credit to PJ though as his three three-pointers in this game turned out to be absolutely crucial and after holiday fouls Kyrie on a three-point attempt of his own he’s sent to the line for a chance to make it a onep possession game so after allowing a 20-2 run with a chance to put the game game Out Of Reach you’d think they go back to what worked right well for some reason their next possession again starts with Kyrie on Tatum yet it’s Jaylen who’s attacking Washington being forced into a tough spot and turning the ball over after perfect execution for pretty much the entire series it was like they forgot the game plan 17 seconds on the clock Tatum in an open corner with Kyrie and holiday steps into an off the dribble three before setting up any offense like I said though when they do go to the mismatch good things happen Jaylen takes Luca in the post and forces him into committing his fifth foul so they got back to attacking Luca relentlessly which meant they got back to creating highquality shots Horford won’t make them all but this is an attempt you want every single time and by attacking Luca this was eventually bound to happen picking up his sixth and final foul meaning that they’d have to play the last 4 minutes without him this is Kyrie’s time to shine build that Legacy and right away he gets to his spot near the elbow for a pull-up Jay the only problem is that the replacement for Luca after fouling out was Hardaway Jr so Boston sets up their offense in a way that forces him to be the rim protector and they end up with a free two points at the cup there’s just nowhere on the floor to hide hard away even when he’s matched up with holiday that’s an easy Blow by which puts the defense in rotation and you’re right back to giving up quality threes off of kickout passes and with Hardaway they also had two smaller guards on the floor so when Tatum sets up in the mid post it basically looks like he’s shacked down there the Mavs wouldn’t go down without a fight though Kyrie drives and misses a layup which leads to a pretty chaotic possession that ultimately ends up in the hands of lively for a dunk when Kyrie sets up high pick and roll Horford jumps out expecting a switch but the rest of the defense isn’t on the same page holiday sort of hangs out in no man’s land as the low man Tatum chooses not to drop and it’s another easy dunk that makes it a two-point game with just a minute to go Jaylen gets the switch onto Hardaway and from there he’ll attack oneon-one his 24 Point second half is making a pretty strong claim for the finals MVP down four 30 seconds left with shades of 2016 Kyrie’s going to take it to that right wing for a tough three but this time he’s unable to knock it down and that essentially seals the game from there they just have to close it out at the line and walk out of Dallas with the ever imposing three nothing lead even with Kyrie and Luca combining for 62 points christs not playing a single minute and the Celtics once again shooting below their typical percentage from three it’s still wasn’t enough to win a game on their home court and really that shows us just how dominant this team team truly is the Mavs are thoroughly overmatched in the finals the Celtics are now 15 and2 in the playoffs and have a chance to close out game four having only lost 20 total games since the season started in October if you enjoyed this breakdown make sure to drop a like subscribe and turn my post notifications on to be first on more content if you’re interested in my more in-depth research make sure to check out my website and social media profiles you can find those links in the description feel free to let me know down in the comments what you thought of this game as always I hope you all have a great day and I’ll catch you guys in the next one

With Game 3 in Dallas and Porzingis out with an injury, the Mavs had a real chance to defend their home court, but the Celtics had other plans.

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