Luka Doncic Joins Historic List: Mavericks Star Enters NBA Top 10
Dallas Mavericks star Luka Doncic is fast becoming something of an NBA legend in the making and his 33 point performance against the Philadelphia 76ers, which helped his team to a 107-98 victory, was the eighth triple-double of his season and the 44th of a burgeoning career.
That already places the youngster, who turns 23 this month, in tenth place on the all-time NBA triple-double list, which is quite a feat for a player who is only into his fourth season at the American Airline Center side.
Clearly, Doncic’s form is more than enough to earn him a place among the NBA all-star picks for 2022, which would make it four times out of four that the Slovenian has been selected for the showpiece event.
Doncic overtakes Fat Lever, who also represented the Dallas Mavericks in his 12-year NBA career, to move into 10th spot on an illustrious list that has a certain Russell Westbrook sitting at the top of the pile and LeBron James in the fifth spot.
Westbrook, who has had a poor season with the Los Angeles Lakers, has completed 193 triple-doubles, so Doncic has a way to go before he gets close to the summit of this list, but given his age, it is entirely plausible that he could one day sit at the summit.
Interestingly, as a measure of Doncic’s growing star power, it’s worth noting that jersey sales of the popular star’s name and number have crept into fifth place in terms of sales. Ahead of him in this particular list are LeBron James, Steph Curry, Giannis Antetokounmpo, and Kevin Durant.
It’s also clear that Doncic is very popular among his team-mates with his Mavericks colleague Reggie Bullock stating after a recent display;
“The dude is elite,”
“He’s an elite passer and elite scorer. He gets everyone else involved. He can break his player down in iso, and he’s still young, so having a player like that that’s so in control, and at a young age, the future is definitely bright for him, and he led us to a win tonight.”
Doncic has played his part in guiding the Mavericks to the postseason in each of the last two campaigns, and Dallas is currently well placed with a 31-23 record that sits them second in the Southwest Division and in the fifth spot in the Western Conference.
Doncic is a crucial cog in Jason Kidd’s roster, and the Dallas coach will need the former Real Madrid man to keep things going if they are to push for their first NBA title since 2011, the only one in their relatively short history.
On the one hand, you have to applaud the consistency of Doncic’s displays thus far in his NBA career, but this could well end up being something of a double-edged sword. For a player to take to life in the NBA seemingly so easy, there will inevitably be a spell where his levels and numbers will drop, and it’s how he reacts to these lows that may well shape his long-term career.
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