DALLAS — Luka Doncic wouldn’t have even played in what turned out to be a meaningless regular-season finale for the playoff-bound Dallas Mavericks without a reprieve from the NBA.
Coach Jason Kidd said he planned to sit Doncic the rest of the game after he played the entire third quarter, which is part of his normal rotation. He had also played all of the first quarter and part of the second, also the norm. The Spurs were already locked in to the final spot in the Western Conference play-in tournament as the 10th seed, set to play at ninth-seeded New Orleans on Wednesday. The winner plays the loser between No. 7 Minnesota and the eighth-seeded Los Angeles Clippers.
With the league’s third-leading scorer cleared to play, Kidd said before the game his club was treating it as “the last dress rehearsal before the real season starts.”