The Dallas Mavericks (16-9) were eliminated from the NBA Cup on Tuesday with a 118-104 loss to the Oklahoma City Thunder (19-5). However, the 14-point margin doesn’t even begin to reflect the size of the egg the Mavericks laid at Paycom Center.

The swarming Thunder defense gave Dallas thrills all night long as Oklahoma City held Dallas to 15 points below its season average. Shai Gilgeous-Alexander scored 39 points on 15 of 23 shooting, including 5 of 9 from 3-point range. He also grabbed eight rebounds and grabbed three steals in the win.

Luka Dončić and Kyrie Irving combined to score just 12 of 29 goals in the loss. Irving scored 17 points and Dončić scored 16 points and 11 points, but turned the ball over five times in the loss. Tuesday night marked the first time this year that a team held both Dončić and Irving under 20 points. You just shot. Here are six stats that tell the story of the Mavs’ no-show in Oklahoma City.

15-1: Thunder run to start the first quarter

Dallas landed the first blow of the game when Irving and Klay Thompson each scored on their first 3-point attempts, giving the Mavs an 8-0 lead less than two minutes into the game. The Thunder responded with some sharp shooting, scoring 15 of the game’s next 16 points and taking a 15-9 lead with seven minutes left in the first. Gilgeous-Alexander hit a smooth 3-pointer behind, and Lugenz Dort followed up with two more on back-to-back possessions.

The two teams traded the lead back and forth for the remainder of the first quarter until turnovers began to intensify for the Mavs towards the end of the quarter. Oklahoma City took a 32-24 lead at the end of a game after late three-pointers from Alex Caruso and Gilgeous-Alexander. SGA outscored the Mavs with 16 points on 5 of 9 shooting in the semifinals.

7: Mavericks turnovers in the first quarter

Somehow, the Mavs were significantly worse at keeping the ball at 11-1 to start the game than they were at 5-7 to start the season. Dallas ranked 17th in the NBA in turnover rate over the last 12 games leading up to the NBA Cup quarterfinals. Meanwhile, the Thunder came into the game ranked first in the NBA (12.1). They forced the Mavs into seven turnovers in the first quarter on Tuesday and scored 12 points from those turnovers.

Dončić converted the ball three times for the Mavs, twice on those long quarterback passes in the backcourt to a teammate running away for a defensive rebound. Apparently this tendency found its way into the Thunder’s reconnaissance reports. Turning the ball over seven times in a quarter is abhorrent, as is the Mavs’ sloppy decision-making and tough Oklahoma City defense, which stifled the Mavs’ offensive rhythm for much of the first half.

The Thunder outscored the Mavs 36-17 on the night due to opponents’ turnovers, and that’s exactly why they were able to dominate Dallas despite having a poorer shooting percentage from both the field and 3-point land.

1 of 7: Luka Dončić shoots in the first half

Dončić, who came into the game shortly after being named Western Conference Player of the Week, is typically a chess master at beating the high doubles team. But Oklahoma City’s defensive attack really gave Dončić trouble in the first half. The Thunder forced the ball out of Dončić’s hands as he tried to initiate the Dallas offense, and also prevented him from penetrating deep enough to get one of his patented lob looks. He rarely found an open look, shooting just 1 of 7 from the field (0 of 3 from 3-point range) and scoring a whopping two points in the first half. He also turned the ball over four times. The Thunder defense sent six different defenders against Dončić during the game, holding him to his lowest point total in a game since he scored 15 in 28 minutes in a 113-106 loss to the New Orleans Pelicans on March 8, 2023.

25: Naji Marshall and Klay Thompson score in the first half

Photo by Zach Beeker/NBAE via Getty Images

The guys around Dončić picked him up in the first half, especially Naji Marshall from the bench. Marshall shot 6 of 7 from the field and scored 14 points in 15 minutes to keep the Mavs’ heads above water. Tuesday’s game in Oklahoma City was Marshall’s first game back after missing the last four games because of the illness that is still lurking in the Mavericks’ locker room. He hit a turn-around jumper and then attempted a tough floater in traffic late in the quarter to keep the Mavs in the loop. They were down 57-51 with 1:45 left in the first half. The next time, Thompson hit a three-ball corner to bring the Mavs to within 57-54 at halftime. Thompson scored 11 goals in the first half on 4 of 8 shooting and 3 of 6 from behind the arc. Marshall and Thompson each scored 19 points in the loss.

16-4: Thunder run to start the third quarter

The Mavericks trailed by just three points at halftime, but the Thunder showed Dallas how precarious the situation can be when they opened the third quarter with a 10-2 run that gave OKC its first double-digit lead of the game. Gilgeous-Alexander provided the game-winning scoring touch and found small gaps in the Dallas defense for open jumpers and lanes as needed as the quarter progressed.

He found a pull-up jumper there with 7:45 left in the third period, giving Oklahoma City a 67-56 lead. He then hit his third three-pointer of the game off an offensive rebound from Cason Wallace, giving the Thunder a 70-58 lead. Wallace’s 3-pointer the next time created a 15-point lead, sent the Thunder crowd into a frenzy and forced a Dallas timeout. Midway through the third period, Gilgeous-Alexander had collected 29 points, nine from Dončić and Irving. Combined. That’s right – he alone tripled two of the NBA’s best scorers.

20 of 50 (40%): Oklahoma City 3-point shooting

The Thunder came into the game averaging just over 13 3-pointers per game. Isaiah Joe’s long ball from nearby Norman at the buzzer in the third quarter was Oklahoma City’s 16th of the game. The 20 points they scored against the Mavs are a new season high. At no point did the Mavs make defensive adjustments to accommodate the Thunder’s additional volume from deep.

Oklahoma City was simply inescapable in this game and the Thunder took a 90-73 lead in the fourth quarter, their largest lead of the game. Gilgeous-Alexander, Dort, Wallace and Kenrich Williams all hit three or more 3-pointers in the Thunder’s win. Dallas was able to reduce the lead to single digits twice in the fourth period, but never had enough reserves for a real comeback attempt.

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