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Luka Doncic has been phenomenal for the Dallas Mavericks in their first-round playoffs series with the Los Angeles Clippers; however, he needs to erase his fourth quarter woes and become the closer for the Mavs in the do-or-die Game 7.
As Stat Muse pointed out, Doncic’s fourth quarter struggles are real. Throughout the six games against the Clippers, he started off hot only to cool down in the closing stages. Overall, the Slovenian youngster has scored 127 points in the first half with over 50 percent shooting in each quarter.
Unfortunately, things turn sour in the second half, with the Mavs star only scoring 48 in the third quarter and a total of 29 in the final period. What’s more concerning is the fact that Doncic is only shooting 31 percent in the fourth quarter–highlighted by his 25 percent shooting clip from deep. Ouch!
Luka Doncic vs Clippers by quarter
1Q: 66 PTS, 51 FG%, 43 3P%2Q: 61 PTS, 61 FG%, 58 3P%3Q: 48 PTS, 46 FG%, 38 3P%4Q: 29 PTS, 31 FG%, 25 3P% pic.twitter.com/hXPMSnRrvY
— StatMuse (@statmuse) June 5, 2021
Now, this is certainly not only Luka Doncic’s fault alone. In Game 3, the Mavs playmaker was bothered by his neck injury in the second half. The same thing happened in Game 4 and he was clearly not himself during those contests.
Moreover, given Luka’s tendency to start hot, the Clippers defense only tighten up on him in the final period to make life hard for him to close out. That is why the likes of Tim Hardaway Jr., Jalen Brunson and Kristaps Porzingis have seen more opportunities that led to scoring surges in the fourth quarter.
As mentioned, though, such thing cannot happen if the Mavs want to survive the series against the Clippers. Luka needs to be as effective as a closer as he is in the opening minutes to give Dallas the series win they have been craving for.
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