By Dorothy J. Gentry
Sports Editor
Texas Metro News
After leading for much of the game, the Dallas Mavericks missed free throws and tallied excessive turnovers, allowing the Oklahoma City Thunder to storm back in the last minutes of Monday night’s game at American Airlines Center.
The Thunder took the win, 100- 96, in Game 4 of the NBA West- ern Conference semifinals, tying the Series at 2-2.
The two teams head to Oklahoma Wednesday night for a pivotal Game 5. The first team to land four wins heads to the NBA Western Conference Finals and the chance to play for the NBA championship.
Game 6 in the Western Conference Semifinals will be played Saturday in Dallas.
Monday night, Mavs guard Luka Doncic, who finished third in this year’s NBA MVP voting, said the team’s free-throw performance was uninspiring.
“We’ve got to work on our free throws. We only shot 52 percent. It’s unacceptable,” he said.
The Mavs made 12 of 23 free throws attempted. By contrast, the Thunder dropped 23 of 24 free throws.
Doncic went 4-of-6 in free throws, including a miss with 10.1 seconds left in regulation. Had he scored both, he would have tied the game, possibly sending it into overtime.
Meanwhile, Thunder guard Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, who finished second in this year’s NBA MVP voting, tallied 34 points – the majority in the fourth quarter.
Game 4 was “probably the most meaningful game I’ve played in my career,” he said.
Dallas’ power forward-center P.J. Washington, the surprise star of the playoff series, shrugged off concerns the Mavs wouldn’t rebound from Monday’s loss prior to Game 5.
“We know what type of team we are…we know what we have,” he said. “I’m not worried about anyone’s mentality. We’ll get better.”
