The Mavericks return with a dominant win over the Bulls, 119-99

It was a head-to-head matchup between the Chicago Bulls and Dallas Mavericks on Wednesday night as the Mavericks were without Dereck Lively II, PJ Washington, Dante Exum and Maxi Kleber, while Chicago was without Zach LaVine and Lonzo Ball.

With these injuries, Dallas had their first different starting lineup of the season: Luka Doncic, Kyrie Irving, Klay Thompson, Naji Marshall and Daniel Gafford. Chicago started Coby White, Josh Giddey, Ayo Dosunmu, Patrick Williams and Nikola Vucevic.

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Dallas wanted to get off to a better start than they did against Indiana on Monday, or in most first quarters this season, really. They also wanted to get Klay Thompson more involved and get him some early shot attempts, but he missed his first three shots. It was Kyrie Irving scoring six straight points that allowed the Mavs to tie the game at nine early, and then a Luka Doncic three gave them the lead. Klay finally got on the board with a three after that to extend the lead.

The slow start would not be the theme of this first quarter, as Dallas made eight straight baskets in the middle of the quarter, allowing them to take a 24-13 lead. The Bulls closed the lead to 27-24 with about two minutes left in the opening frame, but a three by Doncic and a bad foul by Jalen Smith on Doncic as the clock expired gave the Mavs a 32-24 lead at the end of the quarter. Kyrie Irving’s 15 points were the big difference here.

The Mavs started the second quarter on a 7-0 run to get the lead back to double digits. Coby White and Ayo Dosunmu had a rough start to this game, combining to score a point on 0/12 shooting from the floor and 0/9 from three. Despite that, Chicago was able to make dents in the lead every time Luka Doncic checked out. After the Mavs went up 43-28, Doncic checked out and the Bulls immediately responded with a 9-0 run to get back into the game.

Doncic would check back in after that Chicago run and the lead got right back up to double digits. Coby White’s first basket finally came with a minute left in the first half, but the Mavs would take a 56-45 lead into halftime. Doncic was outstanding in the first 24 minutes with 17 points and nine assists, although he also had three turnovers. Still, he was +27 in a game they led by 11.

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A quick 6-0 run to start the half by the Mavs forced a Chicago timeout just a few minutes later. That timeout wouldn’t work as the Mavs forced three turnovers, blocked a shot and scored seven more points to quickly go up. with 25. Dosunmu, who started the game 0/9, finally broke his streak with two straight threes to end the Dallas run.

This time, the Mavericks were able to hold onto a lead with Luka Doncic on the bench in the third quarter. Chicago got the lead down to 16, but a flagrant foul on Nikola Vucevic to hit Dwight Powell in the face (stop me if you’ve heard that before) was part of a four-point run to extend the lead back to 20. So , Doncic came back and led the Mavs to an 88-68 lead entering the fourth quarter.

The fourth quarter started with a pair of quick baskets by the Mavs to push the lead back to 25. That would be enough to allow the Mavs to kiss the field goal and win 119-99.

Luka Doncic led the way with 27 points, 13 assists, seven rebounds and four steals, but he also had five turnovers. Kyrie Irving had 17 points, 15 of which came in the first quarter, as did Daniel Gafford. Dallas broke this game open in large part due to their defensive effort, forcing 22 turnovers and holding the Bulls to 41.9% shooting from the floor (it was under 40% before some late baskets by Chicago).

Because of the big lead and the injuries, it gave the Mavs a real look at Olivier-Maxence Prosper and was inconsistent. The effort was there, but it was often unpredictable. The game started to slow down for him in the second half, but he likely isn’t ready for consistent minutes when the team is fully healthy.

Nikola Vucevic led the Bulls with 14 points and 10 rebounds, rookie Matas Buzelis had 13 points and Josh Giddey had 10. It wasn’t a great performance for any of their guys without Zach LaVine

The Mavericks improve to 5-3 and finish their five-game homestand Friday night against the Phoenix Suns.

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