This photo isn’t pretty from any angle, but it will still be the most memorable image of the NBA Finals. The brilliant Luka Doncic is sitting on the floor, legs spread apart, face despondent, arms raised and palms up, pleading with anyone who will listen to him to overturn his sixth foul of the night and give the Mavericks a chance to make it back to Game 3.
It was his third foul in five minutes of the fourth quarter, and perhaps the closest call. The Mavericks challenged it in frustration, but the call stood, no matter how long Doncic sat and argued. And the game was over soon after, as the Boston Celtics took a commanding 3-0 series lead with a 106-99 win.
Doncic’s temper and inability to control his emotions with officials will be his legacy from this game and these Finals.
“He definitely has a target on his chest,” Mavericks coach Jason Kidd said. “He has to be able to defend and understand that we’re there to protect him and help him if he gets beat.”
That’s the difficult challenge he’ll have to face in the next phase of his NBA career if he’s to become a champion and fulfill the promise of his extraordinary talent.
But there’s also a team on the other side of the ball that’s pushing him into that outrageous seat on the floor — by overloading the Mavericks with an unparalleled barrage of 3-pointers like we’ve never seen before in the NBA Finals.
fifty six percent All of Boston’s shots in Game 3 were 3-point attempts—the highest rate ever in an NBA Finals game. They have made 43 3-pointers in the series, nearly double the Mavericks’ 22. That plus-21 margin is the largest in any three-game span in Finals history.
It’s just math. Hard math. Threes are bigger than twos, and the more 3s you take, the bigger the advantage becomes, provided you shoot a respectable clip, which the Celtics have (barely) done at 34% (down from 38.8% in the regular season).
And though the calculation seems simple, it has stretched the Mavericks beyond recognition.
The many instances of Doncic failing, then complaining, then slowly — irritatingly — getting defensive may be the lasting image, but others repeated the same sequence.
P.J. Washington displayed a similar frustration when he was whistled for an offensive foul late in the fourth quarter as the Mavericks were trying to tie the score for the first time since the start of the second half. Before he could finish his case, the Celtics raced down the court, where Jrue Holiday drove the lane, drew two defenders, found Derrick White on the perimeter for an open 3 and pushed the lead back to 98-92.
White was 3-of-9 from the field before hitting that shot. But he did what the Celtics have done this season to produce one of the best offensive games in NBA history: he kept shooting.
“I mean I missed a lot in the first half, but they felt good. Back rim. So I’ve been confident all year, in that fourth quarter, I shot really well,” White said. “I just trust the flow of the game and just take and make good shots.”
The Celtics always use the phrase “good shots.” Often, they’re referring to 3-point shots. But it’s not a straightforward analytical play like the Daryl Morey-era Houston Rockets. Or the evolution of a trend that has revolutionized offense in the NBA over the past two decades.
Boston doesn’t have a superstar shooter like Stephen Curry or Klay Thompson, whose uncanny ability from behind the 3-point arc became the cornerstone of Golden State’s offensive system.
No, what Boston is doing as a 3-point shooting team is the result of nearly a decade of team building, tinkering, and a reflection of the Celtics’ winning streak, with the unique but repetitive strengths of their two young stars in Jayson Tatum and Jaylen Brown.
No player is as offensively dominant as players like Doncic or Curry or LeBron James. They need space to work. Sometimes they have to exchange playmaking or scoring duties. It’s often been a peculiar situation. But this year, and especially in these Finals, they have finally “graduated,” as Brown said during the huddle in the second half, to a different level.
“We don’t come in and write on the board, ‘Let’s take 40 3s,’” Tatum told ESPN after the game. “We really play to our strengths every night.
“I don’t want to undermine other teams, but a lot of teams struggle with that because they have one or two guys that can help. And we never really have that.”
Boston has seven players who have made 20 or more 3-pointers this postseason, which ties the most 3-pointers made in a single postseason by any team in NBA history.
Everyone can hit the 3, everyone can drive, everyone can defend. There’s no defensive help when a team is built like this, and 48 minutes of that puts pressure on opposing defenses and pushes stars like Doncic to their breaking point.
“They make it hard,” Kidd said, shaking his head. “They wear you out as the game goes on.”
Boston coach Joe Mazzulla speaks so fast and in such a rhythm that it’s hard to grasp the intelligence and subtlety of his words.
“Anytime you develop a new philosophy or a new style, it takes time to understand and implement,” he said when asked about the number of 3-pointers the Celtics made. “So credit goes to the players who decided how we wanted to play, and we struggled to do that.”
White has heard enough of Mazzulla’s coaching, so he understands what he means. “I think the way he looks at the game is next level,” White told ESPN. “People can say what they want to say. But he looks at the game and what can we take advantage of, how can we take advantage of it and we just move forward based on that.”
Two years ago, the Celtics were defeated in the Finals by the Golden State Warriors, whose 3-point shooting has defined this era in the NBA.
It’s fascinating to look at the changes Boston has made since that loss. But so much has happened since then, from the firing of coach Ime Udoka to the trades of Marcus Smart, Jrue Holiday and Kristaps Porzingis, that the connection becomes blurred upon simple review.
No, these Celtics got here by constantly and rigorously studying their team and experimenting with ways to maximize the talents of their two young stars, fueled by a historic devotion to “good shots.”
The result has been an offensive onslaught that has left Doncic and the Mavericks floundering — and the Celtics one win away from a long-awaited 18th title.
