How The Dallas Mavericks Are Winning With An Old-School Style

It’s no secret league-wide offensive rating has skyrocketed over the last decade. Not only is there more skill on the court than ever, but also more space available for players and teams to use.

Gone are the days of having one designated shooter or two paint-centric bigs in the starting five. Today’s lineups almost always have three or four credible shooters and hardly ever contain more than one center.

That’s what’s made the Dallas Mavericks an interesting watch lately as things slow down just before the playoffs.

This week, they returned Daniel Gafford and Dereck Lively II to a rotation already including Anthony Davis and Kai Jones. And in their last two games, they’ve managed an above-average offensive efficiency (13th).

Why The Mavericks’ Offense Shouldn’t Work

Given three of their best available players are centers, the Mavericks (when healthy) are inevitably forced to play two bigs at once for large parts of the game. This isn’t a novel concept. The Cleveland Cavaliers have put together one of the greatest offensive seasons ever by starting Evan Mobley and Jarrett Allen.

What sets the Cavaliers apart is their accompanying pieces are all very good shooters. Cleveland currently has 11 players shooting over 35 percent from three. Meanwhile, Dallas has only 9, four of whom haven’t been active the last two games.

The Mavericks have fielded five-man combinations featuring only one or two players shooting better than 35 percent from downtown – something hardly ever seen in 2025. Defenses should, in theory, be able to sag off almost everyone and completely wall off any entrance into the paint.

Why The Mavericks’ Offense Still Kind Of Works

Head coach Jason Kidd has developed into quite the Xs and Os wizard since joining the Mavericks in 2021. Last season, I ran a study looking at the best play-callers in the league. Kidd finished first in after-timeout (ATO) points per possession relative to offensive rating.

Kidd has been using his expansive playbook to maximize the strengths of this old-school roster while also implementing modern concepts.

Below, he combines three types of actions: Elbow, Get and Ram. We see the Elbow portion when Caleb Martin enters the ball there to Davis for him to initiate. The Ram aspect (screen the screener) happens when Klay Thompson sets a screen for Gafford, who then sets a screen for Davis. And that interaction – one player screening for another at the elbow – is commonly referred to as Get.

Big-big screening actions this deep in the paint can be hard to defend because they create a momentary pocket of space rollers use to find advantageous openings. Most teams don’t have two guys who match the size of Gafford and Davis to deny them inside leverage on the switch. Also, by having Thompson set that ram screen and pop out, Kidd is occupying the back-line help, giving Gafford a clear runway at the rim.

This time below, Kidd gets the Davis-Gafford snug pick-and-roll going by first having Max Christie come off a decoy action (in this case, it’s an Iverson cut). Martin also cuts that way after making the entry pass. His cut balances the floor in a way where, when Davis decides to drive left, there will only be one help defender on the weak-side of the floor (Caris LeVert), which drastically decreases the Atlanta Hawks’ odds of breaking up the lob.

Double drag is also an effective way to neutralize the concerns of playing two non-shooting bigs together because it puts them directly in the action and makes it harder for the defense to ignore them.

This play is nearly impossible to switch because two big bodies are needed to guard Davis and Gafford. It’s rare someone is versatile enough to guard a titanic center and a slippery guard. So, the ball-handler’s defender is asked to navigate two screens.

Keeping an NBA player in front for that long is a nearly impossible task, which forces whoever is defending the second screener to offer help and that enables the screener to slip free for a shot at the rim against a ill-equipped low man (ignore Gafford’s miss here, the play is still beautiful).

That’s the other part of this: how many teams will have a great point-of-attack defender, two guys big and strong enough to guard Davis and Gafford, and another guy who can provide adequate secondary rim protection? The answer is not very many.

Outside of Kidd’s creativity, the other part of this is physicality. I’ve discussed before how subpar spacing can be worked around using sheer force.

Davis, Gafford and Lively (plus, guys like Naji Marshall and Caleb Martin) are all fierce finishers who aren’t afraid of a little contact. While it isn’t ideal, they can score through congested spaces. Teams also can’t try to hide smaller defenders on them because they’re apt to knock those dudes through the stanchion. Look how Davis has no problem finishing through traffic in the lane:

It is worth noting the Mavericks’ success came against the Hawks and Brooklyn Nets – two below-average defensive clubs. There are teams with the size, length and athleticism to combat Dallas’ twin tower attack (the Houston Rockets, Oklahoma City Thunder and Boston Celtics, to name a few).

Still, after the inexcusable trade of Luka Doncic and the devastating loss of Kyrie Irving, the Mavericks are competitive, which is pretty damn impressive, to say the least. And it’s thanks to a throwback approach offensively led by their trio of talented centers.