The Dallas Mavericks (27-25) shipped themselves up to Boston for an NBA Finals rematch against the Boston Celtics and managed to pull off a truly unexpected 127-120 win. This was a game where the Celtics closed as 12.5-point favorites, and the Mavs were given little to no chance. For good reason! Three projected starters were out against a relatively healthy Boston squad. However, Dallas really played their best basketball since the calendar rolled over to 2025, once again fighting off falling to .500. Here are some stats that defined the game

+19: Dallas’ margin in transition points in the first half

The Mavericks only forced seven first half turnovers, but they were all live ball turnovers, which put them in transition quite a bit. Even with that, Dallas ran quite a bit off misses! That is something we’ve been BEGGING the Mavs to do more of, and they finally did that in the first half in this game.

23: First half points by Klay Thompson

‘Was Luka Doncic holding Klay Thompson back this whole time? My column:’

Obviously this is not true, as the last month of data will show you that Klay has been objectively horrible. HOWEVER, it was very cool to see Klay turn the clock back in this one. Thompson was able to knock down 10-of-13 shots in the first half, including three triples. No matter how much I might be praying on this teams downfall, it’s freaking awesome to watch an all-time great fill it up.

2: Total turnovers committed by Dallas in the first half

You want a stat that defined this game? Dallas only had two turnovers in the first half, which tied their fewest in any half this year, per the TNT broadcast. Dallas without Doncic is going to struggle in this category, but hey, it’s nice to see that this is inside of them from time to time.

1: Shooting outlier game since Christmas

For the first time since what feels like Christmas Day, the Mavericks benefitted from an outlier shooting performance. Dallas was shooting 61% at halftime and was able to maintain it throughout at a pretty high level, shooting 56% for the game as a whole. Awfully impressive, considering Kyrie Irving once again proved that he is unable to shoot the basketball in Boston, going just 7-for-17.

Look, I’m not going to lie on the internet and say I think this is a championship caliber team after the trade. It’s very clearly not. But what I will say is that the Mavericks deserved a game like this. Good on them for taking advantage and getting a big win. We’ll see y’all Saturday afternoon!

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