Dallas, March 28 (BNA): Luka Doncic scored 32 points and the Dallas Mavericks beat the Utah Jazz 114-100 on Sunday evening to give the indoor track a home advantage in what could be a first-round playoff.
The Mavericks (46-29) advanced against the Jazz (45-30) for the fourth seed in the Western Conference and earned a division of the season series, with the home team winning all four games, The Associated Press reports.
Dallas will have to finish a game against Utah if the Jazz maintain their 1 1/2 lead in the Northwest Division over Denver. The Mavericks and Jazz have seven games left.
Rudy Gay scored 18 points for the Jazz, who lost their fourth in a row in a six-game campaign that ended Tuesday night in Los Angeles against the Clippers.
Strong defensive player Rudy Gobert was a late scratcher for Utah with a 7-foot-1 right-footed contusion as 7-foot-1 Hassan Whiteside sat for the second game in a row with a right foot sprain.
Bojan Bogdanovic was knocked out for the ninth time in 10 games as he was suffering from a strain in his right calf, and Utah had a panic in the third quarter when Donovan Mitchell briefly left the game after Dwight Powell landed on the lower right leg.
Mitchell stayed in front of the Utah bench while play continued at the other end and sat on the bench when he finally got up. But Mitchell wasted less than a minute and a half, and finished with 12 points on a 4-of-13 shot.
Doncic beat the end of the first half whistle with the indicators of the longest hat-trick to get the Mavericks one point and made a breakthrough in the second half as Dallas won for the 18th time in 22 home games.
Reggie Bullock reached a season high with seven three-pointers, and finished with 23 points on 7 of 11 shots outside the arc. He had 3 seconds in a row in the middle of the fourth quarter to give Dallas his biggest lead to that point at 17.
Galen Bronson scored 22 points, while Doncic had 10 rebounds and five assists.
Mike Conley and Jordan Clarkson scored 14 points each for Utah.
Hint
Jazz: Coach Quin Snyder said Whiteside was playing in a state of pain and mentioned feeling a loss at Brooklyn last Monday. Whiteside played the next game in Boston. “It’s hard to guess, for how long or how fast,” Snyder said of Whiteside’s prospects.
Mavericks: F Davis Bertans scored six points after missing three games with soreness in the right knee. … J. Sterling Brown is out again after entering COVID-19 protocols during his trip to Minnesota, where he lost to Dallas on Friday.
next one
The Jazz: After completing the Clippers road trip on Tuesday, Utah went home against the Lakers on Thursday. The Jazz 2-0 against the Clippers and 0-2 against the Lakers.
Mavericks: The Lakers visit Tuesday before the Dallas begin their last wild ride of the regular season (four games) in Cleveland on Wednesday, the second night of their game in a row.