(Photo: Danny Bollinger via Getty Images)
Mavericks 98
Wizards 75
January 22, 2018 | American Airlines Center | Dallas, TX
The Washington Wizards are the most unpredictable, yet most predictable team in the NBA this season. For the second time this season, they suffered an embarrassing loss at the hands of the now 16-31 Dallas Mavericks. Similar to their second matchups against Charlotte, Utah, Brooklyn, and Milwaukee, Washington failed to get revenge for stinkers earlier in the season. The Wizards are now 15-11 against teams that are currently under .500, which is the most losses among teams currently in the playoffs and only fewer than the 14-32 Atlanta Hawks (7-13).
Washington had one of their worst shooting performances in team history, but it was not even the worst of the season (which says something in it of itself). After the first quarter, the Wizards shot 16 of 63 (25.4 percent) from the field. They scored 75 points on a shooting slash of 30.6 percent from the field, 21.9 percent from three, and 59.3 percent from the free throw line. "That's a lot of bricks," John Wall summarized.
It is not a good thing when Tim Frazier and Ian Mahinmi are your most efficient scores on the team on any given night. Wall had 11 points on 4 of 15 shooting, which was worse than Bradley Beal's 18 points on 4 of 14 shooting who missed five free throws. The front court combined for 15 points on 6 of 23 shooting and Otto Porter Jr. left the game with a hip strain that might cost him time as the injury continues to flare up. Coming into the game, Kelly Oubre Jr. was averaging 19.5 points on 63.2 percent shooting in his last four games, but he had a regression to the mean in Dallas by scoring just seven points on 2 of 11 shooting for a team penultimate worse -20.
“We didn’t make any shots,” Beal said after the game.
"It's offense," Brooks explained. "We could not make a shot, we could not make a wide open shot, we could not make a layup and we couldn't even make non-contested free throws."
No matter how poor or less talented they are, Dallas has had Washington’s number for as long as some of us can remember as Wizards have lost 15 of their last 16 to the Mavericks. “They've had our number for the last decade,” Beal said. Harrison Barnes continues to look like an actual max player against the Wizards by scoring 20 points and grabbing 10 rebounds in 31 minutes of play. Dennis Smith Jr. won the matchup of North Carolina point guards with 17 points and 6 assists. Even though the Wizards held their opponent to under 100 points to break a 17-game streak, there was still questionable defensive effort even if Wall or Beal believes otherwise.
"I feel like we had great defensive effort, we competed against these guys, challenged their shots," Wall said. "This has probably been the worst shooting percentage I think we had as a whole team like shooting threes, free throws, and field goal percentage."
"It wasn't our defense, we played good defense," Beal said."
We do not have enough fingers to count the number of horrid losses the Wizards have this season in which they put forth disappointing effort (at Lakers, vs. Suns, vs. Mavs, at Hornets, vs. Blazers, at Utah, at Clippers, at Nets, at Nets, at Hawks, vs. Jazz, at Hornets, at Mavs) and that is a nightmare concern for much of Washington, D.C.
Of course, knowing this team, they will play well on national television on Thursday and get a win over the thriving Oklahoma City Thunder in a mini-Scott Brooks homecoming.