Unlike Spurs before the last meeting of the regular season, the Mavs lost Luka Doncic through injury! The Slovenian leader hurt his calf, penalized for your bad timing a few days before the start of the Play-offs.
That fate can sometimes be cruel. This is a match that Luka Doncic was not allowed to play! With a sixteenth technical foul, the Mavs star was banned by the League for the first time, the regulations require. Only, the NBA has decided to pardon the nugget by canceling the latest technical foul, making him available for this derby. With the opportunity to take third place in the West, Jason Kidd didn’t hesitate to match his foal to Gregg Popovich’s band. The rest, we know: Luka Magic gets injured in an action that seems harmless. Forced to return to the locker room, the Slovenian sent shivers down the spines of Texan fans. The news doesn’t take long to get through Shams Charania’s . to fall the athletic † Luka Doncic has a left calf injury and will not finish the game against San Antonio† If we had to write the worst possible scenario for Dallas, it would look something like this.
Mavericks say Luka Doncic has a left calf strain and will miss the rest of the Spurs game tonight.
— Shams Charania (@ShamsCharania) Apr 11, 2022
The little reason for hope for the Texas fanbase is that the best Adrian Wojnarowski ofESPN who will bring it. According to the pope of the scoop, there would be real optimism in Dallas about the seriousness of the injury. It won’t stop fans from worrying, but at least they can believe it.
There is initial optimism that Dallas star Luka Doncic has not suffered a significant injury, a source told ESPN. The team calls it a tense left calf.
— Adrian Wojnarowski (@wojespn) Apr 11, 2022
Now it remains to be determined whether a rest period is necessary and if so, how long we are talking about. Every calf injury is different and we are not doctors so we will avoid making a prediction. According to Jeff Stottswhich works in particular for Rotowire in injury analysis, the average NBA downtime for an injury like this is…16 days† The analyst even gives the example of Frank Ntlikina, who missed 12 days in November due to a sore calf. Like what Dallas medics know well. With the playoffs starting in a short week, that would condemn the Mavs to play the entire first-round start without their star. Luka’s comrades would then have to hold out until his return, without really knowing when he will intervene… Of course we start with a hypothetical scenario, but if it is true, Dallas may fear the worst. The team held up nicely when the Slovenian suffered physical problems at the end of 2021, it’s hard to imagine the Mavs going through the Playoffs without the child prodigy at the helm. The Jazz may have been struggling lately, but we are not talking about the departmental team 3 of Châteauroux. Dallas can’t dream of a long post-season run without being 100% leader and ready to fight. It remains to be seen if he will recover all his abilities to attack the serious stuff.
Bad luck in Dallas! Luka Doncic has a calf injury and it is impossible to know what condition he will be in when playing the first round of the Play-offs. A sore spot from the local star on the last night of the regular, we know fans must be in PLS right now…
Text source: The Athletic / ESPN
