Luka Doncic got you here! 🗣️ – Monica McNutt on future return to Finals for Mavericks | First Take

Luka Doncic got you here! 🗣️ – Monica McNutt on future return to Finals for Mavericks | First Take

the Maverick season may not have finished how they hoped for raising a Larry O’Brien but let’s not diminish the run that Luca Kyrie and the Mavs had from a fifth seed all the way to a finals appearance now despite his much malign defense LCA donic led the Mavericks to their first NBA Finals appearance since 2011 becoming the first player in league history to lead an entire postseason listen to this in scoring rebounds assists and steals in the process but obviously not enough to complete the job versus a talented Celtics team so Monica I want to come to you on this do you feel like these playoffs increased or diminished Luca I really want to say it’s a neutral Molly because I don’t think anything was revealed that we didn’t already know so I’m going to go increase I’m going just choose to be optimistic there’s no way that the Mavs get to this point all the stats that you just rattled off without Luca in the finals ultimately you saw a team that just was overmatched or out matched I should say Luke and Kyrie were fantastic but again because of the path that the Celtics had to get there I think most of us did not give them credit for how um challenging they could be on both sides of the basketball like they were uniquely poised and skilled and have the roster to match up with what the Mavs are looking to do so to me I’m going to say it increased because Luka got you here right we talked about it for the Celtics in terms of the opportunity to grow and learn and how many times they have been close but not quite so I think increase cuz they don’t get there without luuka and the things that we saw that are areas of growth for him I think we already knew that if you’ve been following him through the regular season UD D what do you think did he move the needle either way well um Stephen in the building today so I got my suit I got my suit gang right there steing in steing in with my suit game right I gotta agree with Monica I say increased I mean we talk about Dallas is not there if Luca is not on that team and we talk about the statistics the first to lead in points rebounds assist and steals so what we saw in that finals is we just saw some immaturity but what we saw from the Lakers was maturity we forget about the sleepless nights we forget about the losses we forget about the immature Jason Tatum we forget about the immature jayen Brown they had to go through this process Luca is just going through the process I don’t think he diminished his his players U ratings or any of that at all I think he increased it Wendy what do you think has the narrative changed on him I The Narrative hasn’t changed but I think he was terrific in the postseason and I think one of the things that’s most impressive about him is how many upsets he’s now got on his resume in the playoffs obviously the one with the Suns two years ago I thought that Suns team was headed to the finals for sure and had a great chance to win that was as prepared of a team to get to the finals as I’d ever covered almost six I think they had 62 or 63 wins or something like that and Luca just took him down and now he comes into this postseason now I know I know that saying that there was a big difference between the five seed and the one seed in the west you know that’s not really true because of how tightly packed the the talent is there but they were they want three straight Series where they won as the underdog as the as the lower seed I’m telling you I went to game five in La when they played the Clippers in the first round and I know the Kawai was banged up but it was 2-2 and that series certainly felt like it could go either way and he was brilliant um you know the the Timberwolves were is riding as high as they have in their in their franchise history uh coming off that series victory over Denver they had homecourt they had huge momentum anunt was playing the best basketball of his career and Luca came in there and totally LED that charge and taking that team down in five games all of that stuff is incredibly impressive um you know to to have you know already you know four Series in your career where you’ve won as the as not having homecourt Advantage I mean that’s LeBron James type stuff at this point his career um I think what it comes back to is what we know about him which is that he struggles defensively when he has to give Max Energy offensively and what I mean by that Molly is in the second half of the Season down the stretch of the Year Luca had played some of the best defense of his career he was downright at times a plus Defender as a as a postup Defender there were time you know because he’s big and strong um and then I think what happened was when you got into the later stages of the playoffs and they were asking so much of him on the offensive end both in terms of the usage rate and the minutes he just took he took it easy and took took breaks on the defensive end and that’s something we see players do literally at every level you see high school stars do the same thing and that was a regression from Luca and that’s why you hear people from the Mavericks and elsewhere talk about his conditioning and you know I you know and and so but that was already there but I think all in all Luca had a tremendous postseason certainly elevated himself and uh you know the the future is very bright for him in the Mavericks yeah I think he showed us even more that he can get it done and what you alluded to the other day on the show and just now obviously the issue being what he can control he needs to control in terms of the refs and the conditioning to obviously take you to the next level Wendy I’m going to come back to you on this who do you feel like should be the favorites in the west next season Molly you are so right this next month is going to be so fascinating for some of these Western teams that have big things going on in this off season and because everybody is so tightly packed individual moves that happen uh in the next few weeks could very well determine the title next year I mean it was right about this week last year where the Chris ABS porzingis trade started getting going and arguably that was one of the biggest moves that happened in the whole NBA last year so My pick on this question is the Nuggets I think the nuggets are still very formidable I think if the Nuggets had reached the finals against the Celtics I think we’d still be working the the NBA Finals right now I think that series is a seven game series to me Shay gilders Alexander and Jaylen Williams are the closest duo we have when you talk about pairs to compare a guy to what we’ve seen from Tatum and brown but for me for this question I’m going back to the Nuggets because I still think Nicola yic is that dominant in the league okay so I’ve heard nuggets I’ve heard t-wolves I saw OKC getting getting my final answer hold on time out who was just in the finals the Dallas Mavericks so no no love for Dallas in terms of repeating getting back I mean I think D I think no no disrespect but I think Dallas caught lightning in the bottle I think with yeah I think with that trade I think they surprised a lot of people I think those guys and those pieces fit a lot better than people anticipated that they would fit I think they brought in those dogs so that changed the mentality and and what how we View Dallas um but I don’t know if they do it again next year right away right the Dallas thing is interesting and one of my favorite numbers from the postseason run was if you looked at their defensive rating from February to the end of the season it was only like a s margin between what Dallas was able to do and Boston was able to do and Boston’s defense was vaed all year long but I kind of think back to the year the Lakers got to the Conference Finals after LeBron was sitting out and then they had that run with ad and he got healthy and then they made some trades and it was like a shorter SP I do wonder what it’s going to look like through the duration of a year now on the one hand you could get better more continuity all of that good stuff and on the other hand you got to extend out your consistency at being great there’s no way they get back to the finals next year if Luca doesn’t fix his habits and these are things that we talk about the maturity being challenged by your coaching staff in your locker room you caught lightning in the bottle this year you’re not going to get there the same way you did like you got here this year you’re gonna have to get better you’re gonna have to do better Yeah Wendy where are you on this yeah so I definitely put Dallas very high up there I I might even have him second I I I think it would have been amazing if Denver had had beaten Minnesota to see how that series went because I don’t think Minnesota quite handled the success of that very well they just didn’t start that series out at home with the same momentum you felt their inexperience in those first couple of games in Minnesota and they went down 02 I don’t think that happens if it’s Denver so I think Denver Dallas in the Conference Finals would have been remarkable I don’t know who wins that series if they’re in a full power Dallas can improve their roster they they still have some trade assets that they can use and I think they will use it they have a they have shown that they’re willing to go right now they have traded away draft Assets in 2029 2030 um I think that they will keep doing I think that they could use another Wing Defender um they’re still kind of missing the the you know the Dorian finny Smith role when they traded it away was still was a great trade it was for he was in the deal for Kyrie Irving they don’t have that type of player that You’ need against a team like Boston so I think they’ll be out in the market I don’t think they’re getting another star but I think that they can improve this team and and Elevate themselves I will say something about Oklahoma City here one of the most interesting things in this offseason that won’t be something that’s discussed routinely on our shows right at the start is that the Oklahoma City Thunder have $30 million in salary cap room wow now I can’t remember the last time we saw a team Finish First in their conference and that’s what they were they were the number one seed that goes into the offseason with $30 million in cap room now they’ve got a bunch of players on their roster they’ve got to pay into the future Jaylen Williams I think is going to be a high earner Chad holgren is going to be a high earner they they can’t go crazy also they’re not really a free agent destination but there’s a lot of different ways to use salary cap space you can use it to absorb players in trade specifically so I think one of the big things out there as you look at the West for next year what do the Thunder do with that $30 million is it something that gives them a shortterm or medium-term bounce that changes this conversation so again I say this is a this is a really good topic here in mid June boy is it going to be interesting by mid July great abs lot money that’s a lot of money the books that’s a lot Mone and to and to be that good already yeah great point when [Music]

On First Take, Monica McNutt, Brian Windhorst and Udonis Haslem join Molly Qerim to discuss if playoffs increased or diminished Luka Doncic’s standing. Then, the panel debate which teams should be favorites in the Western Conference.

0:00 Luka in playoffs
3:00 Windy on Luka through Finals
5:15 Which team should be West favorites next season?
9:00 Offseason moves

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