MINNEAPOLIS — Consider a couple of snapshots from Game 2 of the Western Conference finals, stark images of the Mavs’ best hope and the Wolves’ current predicament:
In the first, Luka Doncic is bent over at the scorer’s table like an old man at the Y trying to touch his toes and coming up at least half-a-shin short. He has just returned from his second trip to the locker room, apparently the beneficiary of another emergency rubdown. Officially listed with a sprained knee and a bum ankle, his back is just as bad, the result of a hard fall when the conference finals were still an unspoken dream.
“Are you OK?” Kyrie Irving asks.
“Sure,” Luka says, and smiles.
The second image is of a bowed-up Luka glaring at Rudy Gobert, the unfortunate victim of a signature stepback 3 that moments before gave the Mavs a 109-108 win and a shocking 2-0 lead in the series. Or at least shocking to the guy who predicted Minnesota in seven.
“You can’t guard me!” Luka snarls at the reigning Defensive Player of the Year, which is not all he says, actually, but this is a family newspaper.
The Mavs are quick to note that only half their work is done, and they fully expect Minnesota to come to Dallas packing a vengeance. Duly noted. The Nuggets well know this side of the Wolves, who came back from three straight embarrassing losses on the other side of the Western Conference bracket to win Games 6 and 7 convincingly.
Eliminating the defending champs from the tournament did wonders for the reputation of the Wolves, who suddenly found themselves the darlings of the playoffs. Anthony Edwards, in particular. More than one national pundit crowned the 22-year-old marvel “the new face of the NBA.”
Midway through the fourth quarter Friday, in a tunnel near the Wolves’ bench, that handsome face was covered with an oxygen mask.
The face of the NBA at the moment — and maybe for the foreseeable future — is a kid from Slovenia just three years older than Edwards who’s been named first-team All-NBA five times. Which is five more than Edwards, by the way. Luka finished third in the MVP voting. Got four first-place votes. Nikola Jokic piled up 79; Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, 15. Of the three, only Luka is still playing. My guess is this should remove the last of any doubts as to his MVP worthiness going forward. The longer you hang around the playoffs, the more it does for your reputation in general.
Especially when a playoff game ticks down its final, precious moments, and you seize the last one.
Mavs polled by the media afterward said they had no doubts about what Luka would do to Gobert, who, while a fearsome presence in the paint, was out of his element after a screen left him all by his lonesome against one of the game’s best one-on-one players. For that matter, Luka wasn’t the only one who gave Gobert fits Friday. Dereck Lively II and Daniel Gafford more than held their own. Gafford even made a shot from the seat of his pants, which might have been the longest he’s made since he got here.
“I just threw it up there,” he said, “and the man upstairs put it in the basket for me.”
Luka and Irving put in the rest, or at least so it seemed in the fourth quarter, when they scored or assisted on all 30 of the Mavs’ points. As they’ve pretty much done all season, they’ve made a mockery of the wilted notion that they couldn’t play well together. The juxtaposition of their styles remains a wonder to behold — Luka, a NASCAR truck swapping paint; Kyrie, a Formula One racer — but the true beauty of their bond isn’t on the floor.
Before Luka gutted it up for another game with a bad back, knee and ankle, Irving told him not to worry. If he didn’t feel up to it, he’d take over the responsibilities of playing the point. He’d bring up the ball. Get Luka to his spots. Take a little of the load off his broad shoulders. Or that’s what Irving was thinking when he went over to ask Luka how he was feeling going into the fourth quarter anyway.
He subsequently got another up-close look at the side of his running buddy familiar to the locals. Like Jason Kidd said again Friday, Luka loves the moment. The quality separates the great from the good and, at the moment, the Mavs from the Wolves.
“There are moments where he shows his brilliance and can score so easily,” Irving said, “and then he comes back and he looks like he’s laboring a little bit, but that guy’s a warrior.”
Gobert knew it even before Luka put him on skates, then put Game 2 away. The ensuing remarks by the Mavs’ hero might have been a little payback for a poke in the ribs earlier. Gobert said he didn’t hear Luka’s boast, but then he didn’t have to.
“He says that every night.”
From here on out, the Wolves may have to get used to it. They’ve tried everything they know so far — different looks, different defenders — and still he makes the right read or shot.
The would-be face of the NBA knows what’s up.
“It’s all him,” Edwards said of Luka. “We’ve just got to figure him out.”
Good luck with that, Ant. You’re not the first, and you won’t be the last.
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