Jalen Brunson and Maxi Kleber led the Dallas Mavericks to their first play-off series win against the Utah Jazz. In the absence of Luka Doncic, the Würzburger had already known in the morning how the evening was going to go.
Maxi Kleber thus suspected it – and then excelled in game two against the Utah Jazz with a personal best and eight converted threes. “I’m going to let ten threes fly today,” he told Dorian Finney-Smith early on, the Würzburg native reported after the best play-off game of his career.
In a 110-104 win, the 30-year-old sank eight of his total of eleven attempts “from downtown” – a remarkable scoring rate from behind the three-point line. Eight threes in a knockout game – even Kleber’s predecessor Dirk Nowitzki had never managed that. “That was a hot hand and when I’m open I like to keep throwing,” Kleber told dpa.
Brunson cracks 40
By tying the game at 1-1, the Mavericks still have every chance of advancing to the second round. The Texans hadn’t managed something like that since winning the title in 2011. Now it’s off to the Great Salt Lake, where the Mavs recently lost eleven games in a row – making Monday’s success all the more important. Kleber said he now travels to Utah with an “excellent feeling”. The injured Luka Doncic should also finally be back on Thursday.
Representing Doncic’s position, Jalen Brunson excelled with a career-best 41 points. Kleber was the Mavericks’ second-best scorer with 25 points and an exceptional 72.7 percent shooting percentage. “I’m very happy for him. The way he played tonight – outstanding,” Brunson said of his German teammate.
Kleber’s personal best in the NBA is 26 points in a game. In the play-offs, he never scored more than 14 points in a game before. Yet Kleber had sunk only 19 percent of his threes since the All-Star break. “He didn’t hit those in the last games of the main round. But he’s a professional. He just keeps going. He’s got to shoot those because he can. And today he made them. He was great today,” praised Mavericks coach Jason Kidd.
“We’re in the playoffs, the numbers don’t matter “
Despite the difficulties and the injury layoff at the end of the main round, Kleber had no doubts about himself. “It’s obviously a big boost. But even in the games before, when I didn’t pitch well, I did a lot of things right and we won. That’s the most important thing. We’re in the play-offs, the numbers don’t matter,” he stressed.
That’s why he was most happy about the comeback in front of his own fans, because in the meantime Utah already had a ten-point lead in the second half. “Very, very, very important,” Kleber said. “We stuck together and we fought.” That pleased Dirk Nowitzki, too, who cheered the win with a tweet immediately after the end.
Warriors turn game against Nuggets
Before the Mavericks’ win, the Philadelphia 76ers had won their second game against the Toronto Raptors 112-97. In the series it is 2:0 for the favoured team around Joel Embiid and James Harden – Embiid came up with 31 points and eleven rebounds. German Isaac Bonga was on the bench for the Raptors without any minutes of action.
The Golden State Warriors also already lead 2-0, with a 126-106 win over the Denver Nuggets in their second home game. The recently injured Steph Curry came off the bench again, but still had the best score with 34 points. For the Nuggets, who were ahead by twelve points before the half-time break, star centre Nikola Jokic flew off the court in the final quarter.
