The Dallas Mavericks had Victor Wembanyama wobbling at the foul line and still could not get the game over the finish line. In San Antonio’s 112-111 victory Wednesday, Wembanyama missed three of his final four free throws, yet Dallas went scoreless for the last 101 seconds. The Mavericks did not lose those closing possessions to one dramatic mistake.
They lost them in installments: a miss, a rebound, a turnover, another miss and, finally, a shot that arrived too late.
That sequence deserves more attention than the 52 points beside Wembanyama’s name. The San Antonio star was extraordinary, with 24 rebounds and eight blocks, but Dallas still had a path after Naji Marshall’s 23-foot three tied the score at 111-111 with 1:41 remaining. The Spurs scored only one point after the tie. Dallas’s defense did enough in that stretch. Its offense did not.
Start with the possession that could have put the Mavericks ahead. At 1:29, Marshall blocked De’Aaron Fox’s 13-foot pullup and secured the defensive rebound. That was a complete stop, the kind of play that gives a team control of the ending.
Five seconds later, Marshall’s pass became a turnover when Devin Vassell stole it. San Antonio did not score on that possession, but Dallas had surrendered the ball it had worked to earn.
The next Spurs possession produced a chance for Dallas anyway. Wembanyama missed a 31-foot three with 1:02 left, and Kyrie Irving collected the defensive rebound. The Mavericks had the ball, a tied score and enough time to run something deliberate. Irving’s 27-foot pullup three with 43.3 seconds remaining missed, and Stephon Castle secured the rebound.
Those were separate problems. Marshall’s error erased a possession. Irving’s miss ended another. Castle’s rebound prevented Dallas from getting a second chance on the second one. A late-game box score can compress all of that into zero points, but the possessions were not interchangeable. Dallas needed one basket and instead kept handing San Antonio another opportunity to decide the game.
The Spurs’ deciding point came after Wembanyama had already made the ending unusually hospitable. At 24.2 seconds, P.J. Washington fouled him. Wembanyama split the pair of free throws, putting San Antonio up 112-111. Earlier, at 2:10, he had missed both shots after another foul. From 2:10 onward, he converted only one of four free throws.
That was the opening Dallas needed to use. Instead, after a timeout, the final possession began with 24.2 seconds and ended with Irving missing a 15-foot shot at 2.5 seconds. Dylan Harper took the defensive rebound, and the Mavericks never got another attempt.
The last shot would have put Dallas ahead; it was not blocked, rushed at the horn or lost to some bizarre deflection. It simply came with 2.5 seconds left, leaving no practical chance to correct it.
There had been warning signs before the final minute. Dallas had recovered from a 19-point deficit and won the second half 60-44. Marshall supplied 13 points in the fourth quarter, making all three of his threes in the period.
