Off to a 24-19 start halfway through the season, the Dallas Mavericks are truly one of the surprising teams this season. After the DeAndre Jordan debacle, many people (myself included) picked the team to finish closer to the bottom of the conference than the top.
As of this post, the Mavericks have the 5th-best record in the Western Conference, Rick Carlisle deserves heavy consideration for Coach of the Year, and Dirk Nowitzki appears to have picked up a few secrets from Tim Duncan in the battle with father time.
But some of their success doesn’t make sense; the Mavericks are allowing more points per 100 possessions than they are scoring, per Basketball-Reference.com, resulting in an expected win/loss record of 21-22. The Mavs rely heavily on the oft-injured Deron Williams, Wesley Matthews averages 33 minutes per game on a recently repaired Achilles tendon, their best player is 37 years old and the team is playing JaVale McGee unironically.
The point differential can be explained somewhat by sample size. Of the Mavericks’ 24 wins, only two are by more than 15 points, but six of their 19 losses are by at least 15 points (and three others are by 14 points). They have either won by a relatively small margin or been blown out using 15 points as the arbitrary cut-off, which explains their poor net differential to start the season.
But none of this explains how the Mavericks are winning. A team with injury issues like theirs shouldn’t be competitive in a conference as impressive as the Western Conference, and yet, they are doing just that, whether it be with smoke and mirrors or some other form of magic.
Offense
The Mavericks have relied on their offense during Carlisle’s tenure, and although they have slumped some this season, they still carry some of the characteristics of a strong offense.
Jump shooting teams can’t win championships.
One of the most frustrating phrases for any basketball team that has actually paid attention over the past decade in the NBA. The three-point shot is one of the most efficient shots in the game (which includes the free throw and shots at the rim), and the Mavs utilize the three more than almost any other team. A third of the Mavericks’ shots have been from long-range, ranking them fifth in the league in three-point rate. While the percentage of threes they have made this season is below average (34.2 percent compared to a league average of 35.1 percent) the sheer volume of attempts from efficient areas on the floor helps offset the percentage.
The number of threes the Mavericks take is impressive, but the quality of looks the Mavericks get is equally impressive. Using the definitions provided by NBA.com, the Mavericks take the second-most threes in the league that can be classified as “open” (nearest defender between 4-6 feet) or “wide open” (6+ feet).
The Mavericks don’t have the highest number of open or wide open 3s, but they are near the top (2nd in the league, just ahead of Denver and Toronto and behind Miami). But because of the volume of 3s the Mavericks take, this translates to just over 22 open 3s per game (9th in the league).
While the team has a few good shooters, there isn’t a player (outside of Dirk) on the roster that can create his own shot. To combat the lack of individual talent, the Mavericks move the ball more than almost any other team. According to NBA.com’s player tracking data, the Mavericks average the fourth-most passes per game. But even more impressively, the Mavericks are moving the ball as often as they are while turning the ball over on only 12.5 percent of their possessions (fourth-best in the league), per basketball-reference.com.
Moving the ball without turning it over puts pressure on the defense, which could point to one reason why the Mavericks get so many open 3s.
The Mavericks aren’t perfect on offense, however. While they take one of the highest percentages of threes in the league, they also take one of the lowest percentages of shots around the rim. The Mavericks shoot 24.7 percent of their shots within three feet this season — the third-lowest mark in the league. In the past, they could rely on lobs from Tyson Chandler and Brandan Wright to account for some of the shots around the rim, but the Mavericks don’t have athletes on the level of those two this season, and it could be a reason the Mavericks’ offense isn’t as strong as it’s been in previous years.
The defense, however, has been one of the strongest under Carlisle’s regime. The Mavericks have a defensive rating of 104.9, above league average for the first time since the 2012 season, but it’s possible that luck has something to do with it.
Defense
Kenpom.com, among other sites, has explained why three-point attempts allowed is a better descriptor of a good defense than three-point percentage. The average conversion percentage for a three-point attempt is 35.1 percent this season. The Mavericks are allowing their opponents to shoot threes on 29.5 percent of their shot attempts (ninth-worst mark in the league), but opponents are shooting only 34.2 percent on those threes. It’s not a significant difference, but over the course of a few games, the Mavericks are getting back a point or two that the average team isn’t.
Threes from the corner are even more curious as the Mavericks allow 26.5 percent of opponents’ threes from the corner (league average is 24.4 percent) and opponents are shooting only 36.2 percent from the corner (league average is 37.4 percent).
This isn’t to say the Mavericks aren’t imposing any of their own will on the defensive end. While they give up more threes than the average team, they are excellent at defending (or more accurately, not allowing) the other efficient shots for the opposition.
The Mavericks don’t allow opponents to shoot at the rim, allowing opponents to shoot only 26.6 percent of their shots within three feet (the third-best mark in the league). Even though the Mavs’ defense allows opponents to shoot a high percentage at the rim, they don’t attempt enough of those shots to drag down the efficiency (much like the effect the Mavericks shooting threes has on their offense, only completely opposite).
When the opponent does get to the rim — or any other part of the floor, for that matter — the Mavericks don’t commit silly fouls that put the opponents on the free throw line.
The “four factors,” as described by Dean Oliver, are some of the more important elements to winning a game in the NBA. One of those factors is free throws per field goal attempt. The object on offense is to get to the line as often as possible, as the free throw is an incredibly efficient shot, and on defense, the object is to not allow opponents to shoot free throws. The Mavericks have the fifth-lowest opponent free throw rate, and have an incredible “free throw defense,” allowing opponents to shoot only 74 percent from the charity stripe (league average is 75.6 percent, and, yes, this is a joke).
The question remains whether the Mavericks are better than their point differential or not as good as their record indicates. The obvious answer is somewhere in the middle, but it can’t be overstated how good of a job both Rick Carlisle and Mark Cuban have done with this roster. And more importantly, while Kobe Bryant is having his season-long going away party, this could be the last good season of Dirk Nowitzki we’ll ever witness.
All stats are from NBA.com player tracking or Basketball-Reference.com unless otherwise noted.