The Golden State Warriors are one win away from the NBA Finals after beating the Dallas Mavericks 109-100 in Game 3 on Sunday night. Led by a 31-point performance from Stephen Curry and 27 points from Andrew Wiggins, Golden State again asserted its dominance over Dallas to take a 3-0 series lead.
Luka Doncic tried to win the Mavericks with 40 points, 11 rebounds and three assists but, again, despite Jalen Brunson and Spencer Dinwiddie’s combined 46 points, Dallas didn’t have enough in the tank to finish the game. victoire. come back to this series.
The Warriors will look to close out that series on Tuesday, and if they do, they’ll be waiting for the winner of the Boston Celtics-Miami Heat series in the Eastern Conference.
Here are three takeaways from Game 3 in Dallas.
1. Andrew Wiggins, salute
Let’s take a look at that absurd dunk Wiggins had on Doncic in the fourth quarter.
It’s the Dunk material of the year right there. In fact, it’s better than all the dunks we saw at the Dunk Contest at All-Star Weekend earlier this season. It was a dunk that was the icing on the cake in what was another standout performance from Wiggins, who finished with a playoff career-high 27 points to go along with 11 boards and three assists while shooting at 55% of the land.
Wiggins has been exceptional for Golden State throughout the series, averaging 20+ points while drawing the toughest defensive task keeping Doncic on the other end of the field. While Doncic still gets his points, Wiggins has been incredibly tough on the Slovenian superstar, and somehow he still finds enough energy to finish dunks like that in the fourth quarter despite the fact that he has played the most minutes of any Warriors player.
Wiggins sometimes goes from the second-best player on this team to the ideal role Golden State needs him when Curry and Klay Thompson find themselves in trouble. His consistent production at both ends of the field, which also included six offensive rebounds, is part of the reason Dallas is having such a miserable time trying to keep this Warriors team.
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2. Dallas role players don’t show up in critical Game 3
When the Mavericks fell 0-2 in the conference semifinals to the Phoenix Suns, they responded with four of their five starters scoring in double figures to win Game 3. Reggie Bullock, Dorian Finney-Smith and Maxi Kleber combined 43 points in that game to give Dallas — and Doncic — the boost it needed to get back into the series.
This was not the case on Sunday evening. While Doncic received plenty of help from backcourt teammates in Jalen Brunson and Spencer Dinwiddie, who combined for 46 points, Bullock went scoreless 0-10 from the field in 39 minutes of action. . Finney-Smith had just nine points, while Kleber also finished with zero points 0-5 from the field. When these three guys shoot so badly, Dallas won’t win many games.
Although Dallas managed to keep it closed until the final buzzer, unlike the previous two contests in this series, it just didn’t feel like they could make a legit run without guys like Bullock, Finney- Smith and Kleber.
3. Warriors one win away from the NBA Finals
Golden State has been dominant throughout this series and is now one win away from reaching its sixth NBA Finals in eight years. It’s crazy to think that if it hadn’t been for Thompson and Curry’s injuries over the past two years, the Warriors could be on their way to their eighth straight NBA Finals. is how talented this team has been over the last eight years.
There’s still work to be done, as Doncic and the rest of the Mavericks squad will surely do everything in their power to try and extend this streak and avoid a sweep. But with the Warriors comfortably in control right now, it’s not too early to start thinking about the next opponent on the schedule.