The first part was from Luka Dončić. Kyrie Irving took over in the second.
That was added to a 114-101 Game 6 victory by the Dallas Mavericks over the Los Angeles Clippers on Friday to secure a 4-2 series victory to advance to the second round of the playoffs. The fifth-seeded Mavericks move on to a second-round matchup with the top-seeded Oklahoma City Thunder. The Clippers’ season comes to a disappointing end.
After a 123-93 loss at home in Game 5, the Clippers fell into a 34-26 hole in the first quarter on Friday. They fought back to tie the game at 52 before halftime and held Irving to two points in the first half. That race marked his last stand of the series.
Irving burns with 28 points in the second half
The Mavericks broke the game open after halftime when Irving led a 35-20 run in the third quarter with 13 points in the stanza. There was no comeback in the fourth quarter for the Clippers, whose playmakers failed to match Dallas’ dynamic duo.
After going 1 of 6 in the first half, Irving made 5 of 6 shots in the third quarter. A personal 5-0 run by Irving with a floater in traffic and a second-chance 3-pointer extended Dallas’ lead to a then-game-high 15 points in the final minute of the quarter.
An Irving and-1 triple in the fourth extended Dallas’ lead to 106-82, extinguishing any lingering hopes of a Clippers comeback.
Irving finished with a game-high 30 points after scoring two in the first half. He added six rebounds, four assists, two steals and two blocks. He shot 11 of 19 from the field and 5 of 9 from 3.
Dončić scored 28 points, 13 assists and seven rebounds. On a night in which he struggled from the field (9 of 26, 1 of 10 from 3), he ceded the scoring role to Irving in the second half.
Familiar postseason history for the Clippers
With Kawhi Leonard sidelined and Paul George and James Harden struggling from the field, Los Angeles didn’t have the firepower to compete. Norman Powell led the Clippers in scoring with 20 points off the bench.
George scored 18 points, 11 rebounds and five assists. He shot 6 of 18 from the field and made just 2 of 10 three-point attempts. Harden scored 16 points, 13 assists and seven rebounds. He shot 5 of 16 from the field and missed all six of his 3-point attempts. Russell Westbrook scored six points in nine minutes off the bench.
Leonard missed four of the six games in the series with knee inflammation. He has now played in four of the Clippers’ last 19 playoff games.
The Mavericks outscored the Clippers from the floor (48.2% to 41.5%) and from 3-point range (33.3% to 25.8%) on a night when Dončić struggled with his shot .
The Mavericks now have three days off to prepare for Tuesday’s Game 1 against the Thunder. Awaiting the status of substitute forward Maxi Kleber, who sprained his right shoulder in a hard fall in the second quarter and did not return.
The Clippers move into another offseason of questions surrounding a star-studded roster that failed to compete for a championship and exited in the first round of the playoffs for the second straight season.
