Luka Doncic and Mavericks dodge bullet that could’ve been costly

Will Miller

Dallas Mavericks, Luka Doncic / Sam Hodde/GettyImages

While the Dallas Mavericks tip off NBA Summer League action in Las Vegas today, they also have some players who have been competing for a chance to go to the 2024 Paris Olympics. Dwight Powell is playing for team Canada currently, as Powell recently garnered some attention when he locked up Joel Embiid in Canada’s matchup versus Team USA the other day.

Dallas Mavericks superstar Luka Doncic was also playing in the pre-Olympic Qualifying Tournament, but he was unfortunately eliminated from playing any further because the Slovenian National Team lost to Greece in the Semifinals of the tournament by a blowout score of 98-68.

Doncic had an extremely rough performance in Slovenia’s loss, as he was fairly efficient with 21 points on 7-14 shooting from the field, but couldn’t keep hold of the rock whatsoever as he finished with 10 turnovers in the game. Doncic was clearly still hobbled from the myriad of injuries that he was dealing with in the NBA Playoffs, as he never looked like his normal self once during Olympic qualifying games.

Luka Doncic and Mavericks dodge a bullet with Slovenia missing Olympics

As much pride as Doncic has in playing for his national team, there is a fine line between the overextending oneself because of too much pride in one’s country compared to getting the proper treatment and rest for injuries that would’ve kept Doncic out if it were the regular season, so Doncic’s Olympic run coming to an end is honestly a sigh of relief for many Mavericks fans.

The Mavericks and President of Basketball Operations’ Nico Harrison have been vocal in their support toward Doncic playing for his national team, but with the degree of injuries Doncic is dealing with as well as the fact that he just played 92 games last season, it’s fairly objective to say Doncic should have tried to at least hold out to until the actual Olympics before playing while he’s clearly still in significant pain.

Doncic’s insane competitive fire is an ideal characteristic for a superstar player, but going forward the Mavericks and Doncic may need to operate more carefully in these situations when you take into consideration the immense workload Doncic has carried in his first six NBA seasons on top of playing for his national team nearly every summer since being in Dallas.

Mavericks fans can now rejoice at the fact that Doncic will now at least get a little bit of rest before the start of next season, but it goes without saying that the Mavericks clearly dodged a bullet here, as Doncic could’ve made his injuries even worse if Slovenia continued to advance in the Olympic Qualifying Tournament.

If the Mavericks are unable to compromise with Doncic in situations like this going forward, this could easily become a more destructive scenario if Doncic suffers a career-altering injury at any point, so hopefully the Mavericks learned a lesson from these Olympics qualifying games when one considers how rough Doncic looked on the court.

For more on Luka Doncic and the Dallas Mavericks this offseason, stay tuned as we will have you covered.

Will Miller

Will Miller is a senior contributor and is in his second year with The Smoking Cuban. Will has been following the Dallas Mavericks for over a decade and is currently working on getting a Bachelors in Science in Sports Journalism from the University of North Texas, as he is also covering sports for the North Texas TV station. While Will is opening up his coverage to cover other sports for UNT, basketball and the Dallas Mavericks are his true passion and he hopes to continue writing and producing Mavericks related content as his career continues. Will has very solid in-game analysis and knowledge about the intricacies of the game, and has a very broad understanding about the NBA as a whole. Going forward Will is looking to be more expansive in his coverage of the Mavericks beyond writing as well. Outside of writing about the Mavericks, Will enjoys hanging with friends, going to the gym, and watching other sports and live events.