As I sat there watching American Airlines Center leak endlessly while the camera panned between Mark Cuban and the Mavericks’ ceiling, I tried to take hold of what was actually happening in Game 4 of the 2022 Western Conference Finals.
The Golden State Warriors had an opportunity to book a ticket to the NBA Finals for the 6th time in 8 years. Instead, they found themselves down by 15 at halftime to a team that clearly wasn’t ready to be in the Western Conference Finals to this point.
But the Mavericks didn’t look like the team that didn’t belong on Tuesday. Instead, that was the Warriors. It was a weird game. They were putrid defensively. They had free throws get stuck on the rim. It was one of the most un-Warriros-like performances we’ve seen from them this postseason — that huge Grizzlies blowout sets the standard there.
