‘Ran Out Of Gas Late’: Shorthanded Dallas Mavericks Fall To San Antonio Spurs 122-106 Despite Sergio de Larrea’s 21 Points
DALLAS — The San Antonio Spurs made 5 three-pointers in the first 6:07 of the fourth quarter Saturday night and pulled away from the Dallas Mavericks, 122-106, at American Airlines Center. Dallas played the second night of a back-to-back without Cooper Flagg and Kyrie Irving, and it had erased a 14-point third-quarter deficit to lead 85-84 with 2:01 left in the period.
Rookie Sergio de Larrea led the Mavericks with 21 points, 5 rebounds, and 4 assists off the bench, shooting 9-of-15 from the field and 3-of-4 from three-point range in 33:02. The No. 25 overall pick in the 2026 NBA Draft had not scored in about 8 minutes across his first two NBA games. All 21 of his points came in the first three quarters.
Marcus Sasser added 12 points, 3 rebounds, and 5 assists off the bench. Daniel Gafford had 12 points on 6-of-9 shooting, 9 rebounds, 3 steals, and 2 blocks, and P.J. Washington also scored 12. Zaccharie Risacher finished with 11 points, 4 rebounds, and 2 blocks, and Naji Marshall had 10 points, 4 rebounds, and 5 assists. Dallas’ five starters combined for 50 points, and its bench outscored San Antonio’s reserves 56-28.
Victor Wembanyama led San Antonio with 23 points, 7 rebounds, 2 assists, and 4 blocks on 9-of-18 shooting. Dylan Harper scored 22 points on 9-of-18 shooting with 5 rebounds and 2 assists, De’Aaron Fox had 19 points, 3 rebounds, and 9 assists, and Stephon Castle added 19 points, 4 rebounds, 8 assists, and 3 steals. The Spurs finished with 34 assists on 48 made field goals.
The loss dropped Dallas to 1-2, one night after a 121-105 win over the Indiana Pacers in Indianapolis gave Mavericks coach Dusty May his first win as an NBA head coach. San Antonio also moved to 1-2 after losing 114-110 to the Houston Rockets on Friday, and the win kept the Spurs from their first 0-3 start since the 2008-09 season, The Associated Press reported. The crowd of 19,555 was a sellout.
Dallas Mavericks Erase 14-Point Deficit Before San Antonio Spurs Pull Away
Gafford recorded 2 steals in the first 3:23. The first led to a fast-break dunk that tied the game at 4, and the second set up a Washington floater for Dallas’ first lead. Morez Johnson Jr. committed 3 turnovers in 1:25 on the floor in the first quarter, and San Antonio scored on two of them during an 8-2 run to a 14-8 lead. Marshall scored 9 points in the quarter, and Carter Bryant’s dunk with 28.5 seconds left gave the Spurs a 32-31 lead after one.
De Larrea scored 11 points on 5-of-6 shooting in the second quarter. His lob to Gafford with 7:34 left put Dallas ahead 43-41, and Gafford’s putback dunk at 5:54 made it 49-43 and drew a San Antonio timeout. Sasser’s pull-up jumper with 5:23 left pushed the margin to 51-45, the third time Dallas led by 6.
San Antonio closed the half on a 23-9 run. Wembanyama had 1 point after the first quarter and scored all 11 of his second-quarter points in the final 6:08 of the half, finishing two lobs from Castle and adding a fast-break three, a tip-in, and a hook. Harper scored on a layup and made the free throw with 3.2 seconds left after Julian Champagnie stole the ball from Risacher, and the Spurs led 68-60 at halftime. Dallas committed 8 turnovers in the first half, and San Antonio scored 15 points off them.
The Spurs scored 9 of the first 12 points of the third quarter, and Wembanyama’s alley-oop dunk on a Fox lob made it 77-63 with 8:17 left. Dallas committed 7 turnovers in the first 3:43 of the half, two of them shot-clock violations.
Dallas answered with a 22-7 run over the next 6:16. De Larrea made 2 transition threes, Sasser hit 2 threes, and Johnson Jr. scored 4 points in the stretch. De Larrea’s floater off a Sasser pass with 2:01 left gave the Mavericks an 85-84 lead, and Risacher’s step-back jumper put them back in front 87-86 at 1:28. Castle answered with a three, Wembanyama hit a pull-up three with 35.7 seconds left, and Gafford’s tip-in sent Dallas into the fourth quarter trailing 92-89. The Mavericks made 5 of 6 threes in the third quarter and scored 14 fast-break points.
Gafford’s cutting layup off a Walter Clayton Jr. pass opened the fourth quarter and pulled Dallas within 92-91. San Antonio scored 17 of the next 20 points. Devin Vassell started the run with a three, Tarris Reed Jr. finished an alley-oop, and Champagnie and Harper each made 2 threes as the lead reached 109-94 with 5:53 left. Champagnie scored 8 points and blocked 3 shots in the quarter. Harper’s fast-break dunk with 3:13 to play made it 119-96, San Antonio’s largest lead.
Dallas shot 7-of-22 in the fourth quarter, including 3-of-11 from three, and did not attempt a free throw. Max Christie missed all 4 of his shots in the period and finished with 5 points and 5 rebounds on 2-of-9 shooting.
San Antonio grabbed 15 offensive rebounds and outscored Dallas 25-10 in second-chance points. The Mavericks committed 21 turnovers, and the Spurs scored 26 points off them. Dallas shot 51.1% from the field and made 11 of 28 threes, but it attempted 88 shots to San Antonio’s 101. The Mavericks held a 28-15 edge in fast-break points, and the game had 14 lead changes and 7 ties.
Dusty May Says Mavericks Ran Out Of Gas Without Cooper Flagg, Kyrie Irving
Before tip-off, May said depth, mental toughness, health, and a little luck decide whether a team can carry its energy from one game to the next, and that Friday’s win gave his players a taste of what they can be when they play with physicality. San Antonio outscored Dallas 30-17 in the fourth quarter.
“It’s obviously very difficult what these guys, I mean, San Antonio just had a gut-wrenching defeat last night that we were able to, we were watching as we went into the air,” May said. “And so they played, we were playing in Indianapolis last night, and so it’s the guys that can get in here and do it again day after day. And so I was proud of our guys’ effort. We as a staff thought we competed at a high level. We made it very, very interesting and ultimately just felt like we probably ran out of gas late.”
May said before the game that Flagg had an MRI that showed a left shoulder sprain. Irving sat for injury management on the second night of the back-to-back, and the official scorer’s report listed his left knee. Caleb Martin (right thumb sprain), Tarik Biberović (right heel bursitis), Santi Aldama (right knee surgery), and Dereck Lively II (right foot surgery) were also inactive, and San Antonio played without Tobias Harris (left calf strain) and Jayden Quaintance (right knee surgery). May said Aldama is making progress and Lively is continuing his rehab process. Jett Howard was a game-time decision with a calf injury and played 4:08 in the fourth quarter, and Johnson Jr. played 12:03 under the minutes restriction he has carried in every game this season.
Irving scored 24 points in Friday’s win at Indiana. May said there is a chance Irving plays both ends of a back-to-back later this season, though he did not want to speak for Irving.
“It was more, he’s ready to play at Indiana,” May explained. “Let’s play that, and let’s not make any decisions in advance. Let’s just take this one day at a time and plan accordingly. But it was several conversations, and there wasn’t one thing that tilted it one way or the other.”
Sergio de Larrea Scores 21 In Third NBA Game As Mavericks Lean On Bench
De Larrea checked in with 6:56 left in the first quarter and Dallas trailing 14-8. He shot 6-of-8 for 13 points in the first half, and of his 9 field goals, 5 were floaters and 3 were threes.
May said before the game that Christie played well Friday, that Gafford’s 14 or 15 minutes at Indiana were as productive as they could have been, and that Marshall was exceptional. He also said Risacher’s shots were going to drop.
“You figure it out,” May said. “I mean, we have good players. I mean, I’m very, very confident with the guys that you see. … So we’re not going into this focused on who we don’t have playing, but more of who is playing and how can we help them. And it’s exciting to see them in a different role as well, to have an opportunity to do more.”
“Some of the young guys will have more of an opportunity,” May continued. “Obviously, Sergio and Moussa and those guys will play more minutes than they typically do. And those guys are good players that have earned the opportunity. So it’s more of excitement to go after San Antonio with some different guys.”
May said the reps de Larrea took against Castle are invaluable as the rookie gets stronger and his body adjusts to the speed and athleticism of the NBA. He also said he wishes Dallas could avoid them a little more often.
“I thought he was great,” May said. “In hindsight, I wish we could have gotten him to a point where he could have gotten the catches and not had to initiate the offense and break Castle’s pressure. But I thought he was great. I mean, his defense is improving. I thought his on-ball defense got better. He was chasing down long rebounds. He came up with five rebounds, four assists.”
“Overall just a really, really good game by a young player against one of the best defensive backcourts, when you factor in Castle and Vassell and those guys,” May added. “They’re athletic, they’re strong, and they play hard.”
Only Washington played more minutes for Dallas than de Larrea. Flagg and Irving had taken those minutes in Indianapolis on Friday.
“That’s the best scenario for us, is to have multiple handlers and sub lineups,” May said. “There’s give and take. You match size, you go small, and it seemed like tonight every time we tried to go small against the bigger lineups, they just countered and went small with us. But yeah, I mean, obviously this was a great opportunity for him. He didn’t get the same last night in Indiana for obvious reasons, with Coop and Kyrie getting those minutes.”
“But he’s certainly earned more and more trust, and he’s played like this pretty consistently,” May detailed. “When you factor in summer league, the exhibition play, and in practice, he has a great mindset every day. So 33 minutes against a team like San Antonio, that’s a good night for [de Larrea].”
It was de Larrea’s first time scoring like this, and his first two games went differently. His teammates look for him the same way he looks for them, and the crowd was excellent.
“It’s just to be prepared,” de Larrea said. “I think all of us are connected. We want the best for the team, and all of us are connected to do the best performance possible. Today it was me, probably, but other days are other guys, and that is, I think, is what made this team special. All of us, I think, can do great performances, but at the end, we are helping the team.”
Defense is something de Larrea works on every day. He uses his size to cover space and is still polishing that part of his game.
“Probably this is kind of so. I think for sure a lot of things to improve,” de Larrea explained. “Just rotations on defense, be prepared. … I think I’m working every day for this moment. And I think today was a result of this work.”
The bench knew it had a job to do Saturday, picking up where Irving and Flagg left off Friday. De Larrea’s 21 points led all reserves on either team.
“Just really his poise and him further understanding the game night in, night out,” Gafford said. “He hasn’t really had a good amount of minutes throughout just these first three games, but tonight I feel like he was ready for pretty much anything. And they kinda heated him up, they kinda showed him a little bit of pressure, but I feel like he responded the right way.”
Sasser assisted on 4 of de Larrea’s 9 field goals, including the go-ahead floater in the third quarter. Sasser finished a plus-1 in 26:41.
“I think we do a good [duo],” de Larrea said. “He can release the pressure. He can make a lot of baskets. He’s spreading the court. He can [shoot]. He’s making [the three]. So for me, it’s very good to have this kind of teammates, to pass to them and be sure that they are making the shots.”
De Larrea and Johnson Jr. both joined Dallas out of the 2026 draft, Johnson Jr. as the ninth overall pick. Johnson Jr. had 6 points, 1 rebound, and 2 assists with 4 turnovers and 4 fouls in 12:03.
“I think it’s a pleasure to play with him,” de Larrea said. “He’s a guy who lives 100% every day in the court. And he’s bringing energy, so this energy is like, for me, it’s very important that he’s bringing all this energy to the team, and to have him in the team is great.”
“He’s doing all the work. Probably he doesn’t look like he’s in the stats, but it’s amazing to play with him, and I’m very happy to have him also,” de Larrea noted. “We’re building outside-the-court chemistry, so he’s a good teammate.”
Johnson Jr. scored 4 points in 7:05 of the third quarter on two free throws and a turnaround hook. He also assisted on Sasser’s three that cut the deficit to 84-83.
“Honestly, tonight I felt like he had his first test, and he responded very well to it,” Gafford explained. “It was a lot of frustration throughout the first three games. He’s just been taking, I would say, taking his time and just letting the game slowly develop for him. And he’s finding ways to impact the game, certain ways of just like if he’s either at the four or the five.”
“So he’s just finding ways to just, I would say, build his skill set,” Gafford continued. “And it’s helping us on the floor because he’s opening up so many opportunities for us down the [stretch].”
De Larrea is from Valladolid, Spain, and won a Liga ACB title with Valencia in June, days after Dallas acquired his draft rights. He signed with the Mavericks on July 3 rather than staying overseas for another season.
“I don’t know, probably watching some guys on TV when I was young, even right now,” de Larrea said. “I think I grew up learning about Ricky Rubio, Sergio Rodríguez, Calderón, these Spanish point guards, and I looked a lot when I was young. And probably this watching film of them that brings me to these places.”
Zaccharie Risacher, Walter Clayton Jr., Naji Marshall Round Out Mavericks Rotation
Risacher made 4 of 5 shots for 9 points in the third quarter after going 0-of-2 from the field in the first half. Before the game, May said the staff painted a clear picture of what it needed from Risacher after the opener in Houston, and that Risacher had been very receptive.
“I thought his shots didn’t look rushed,” May said of Risacher’s night in Indianapolis. “He looked like he was playing with a much, we call it quiet eye, a much quieter eye. He looked like he was taking what the game gave him.”
Clayton had 5 assists in 14:31, 3 of them in the fourth quarter, three days after signing a two-way contract with Dallas. Tobi Lawal and Howard scored 5 points apiece in the final 4:29, and Moussa Cissé had 4 points and 4 rebounds in 7:20, including an alley-oop dunk from Marshall in the first quarter.
“Well, a lot of what we do is read and react, and you’re playing off personnel and you’re making decisions based on how you’re being defended,” May said of Clayton before the game. “So we feel comfortable that he can go in and impact this game tonight. He’s a good player. I don’t know if our guys realize, even in a minute or two late games, we’re evaluating them and we’re trying to learn them better. So he had a couple good possessions last night with Moussa and Tobi and those guys. So, yeah, he’ll definitely play.”
Marshall did not play after checking out with 8:28 left in the third quarter. Before the game, May said Marshall took care of the ball better Friday and improved his transition defense drastically over the last week.
“Offensively, we’re very, very comfortable with the ball in his hands,” May said. “He’s one of the guys on our team that can get in the paint without any help. And I thought last night he looked like a veteran quarterback in the pocket. He didn’t look like a young guy in the pocket. He looked like a veteran, and he made a lot of really good plays for us.”
San Antonio Spurs Score 26 Points Off Turnovers, 25 On Second Chances Behind Victor Wembanyama
Johnson Jr. and de Larrea committed 4 turnovers apiece, and Gafford had 3, all of them in the second half. San Antonio finished with 12 steals, led by 3 apiece from Castle and Fox.
May opened his postgame availability by calling San Antonio’s ball pressure the difference. Loose balls the Spurs converted in the open floor fueled even more of that pressure, he said.
“Well, we just gotta find, when you look out there, there’s not a lot of ways to alleviate pressure against San Antonio, because even their guys [that aren’t] Castle are still pretty good defenders,” May said. “But we have to do a better job of finding the guys that can bring it up and break pressure. … We’ve just got to have a little bit tighter plan.”
“But some of them, I thought also they were, I don’t want to say unforced, but we were a little bit sped up after rebounds, after breaks, things like that,” May continued. “And they made it, like most teams in this league, especially the really good ones like San Antonio, they make you pay for those mistakes, and they did tonight. I thought they made a couple runs based on us having some self-inflicted wounds.”
With Flagg and Irving out, a lot of Mavericks were in positions where they were uncomfortable. Everybody felt the weight of the world, according to Gafford.
“I think they just crawled up in our airspace,” Gafford said. “Like I said, a lot of guys probably were uncomfortable in certain situations. But I mean, crawled up into our airspace and just kind of pretty much knocked a lot of DHOs out of place. And really just, it was a real physical game, so.”
Dallas mixed in zone defense, and San Antonio shot 43.5% in the third quarter, when the Mavericks outscored the Spurs 29-24.
“I feel like it helps our communication,” Gafford said. “We’re nonstop talking, we’re making sure guys are in the right spots. And we’re just playing there and being there for each other. It’s kind of like we’re on a [string], and we’re just getting stops.”
Nine Spurs had at least one offensive rebound, led by 4 from Keldon Johnson. Reed grabbed 2 in 6:39 of the fourth quarter, and Luke Kornet also had 2.
“They go with force,” May said. “I thought, and then obviously, [it] is tough to block out just the size [and] athleticism. But I thought at one point we kinda had, I felt like we kinda had a lot of rhythm, the change in defenses in the zone and things like that. They just didn’t look themselves.”
“And then I feel like the offensive rebounds ignited their run, and that’s the trade-off in the zone,” May added. “It’s tough to have blockout responsibilities, and it seemed like, off just memory of their runs, they started playing better whenever Keldon, those guys, got on the glass and got some second shots and got easy baskets.”
Gafford scored 8 points on 4-of-5 shooting in the first half, when Dallas outscored San Antonio 46-44 in the paint. The Spurs finished with a 64-62 edge there.
“We were just making plays and making guys make decisions,” Gafford said. “Set screen, holding them. Wemby and Luke, they were playing in kind of a drop. So we were trying to make sure our guards got downhill. Just had to make the bigs make a decision. We were just trying to finish around the basket too.”
Dallas got a little static and stagnant in the second half, and May credited that as much to San Antonio as to his own team. The Mavericks were outscored 20-16 in the paint after halftime.
“We were hitting very difficult shots, and that’s what they force you to hit,” May said. “And we have guys that can make them. Naji, [de Larrea], those guys have the floaters with their face guard [on] your shooters. I thought we did a nice job of hitting a few mid-ranges and floaters, which kind of loosened them up a little bit.”
“And then when we got into [the] paint, I thought we played off two feet well and had some nice fakes and found backdoor cuts,” May noted. “We were able to finish with the back doors.”
Daniel Gafford, Sergio de Larrea On Facing Wembanyama
Wembanyama shot 9-of-18 and finished a game-high plus-32 in 28:55. Before the game, May said nobody outside the NBA and the French league had game-planned for a player like Wembanyama.
“He’s one of one,” May said. “But no, I mean, obviously the NBA has a lot of guys like him that are just the upper 0.1% at what they do. So it’s going to be a heck of a challenge. I’ve seen him work out up close. It’s impressive how much he puts into his body, his game, his mind, all of it. So it’s going to be a fun challenge.”
Wembanyama blocked Gafford’s turnaround hook with 9:35 left in the third quarter. A minute earlier, Gafford had blocked Wembanyama’s fast-break layup attempt, one of his 2 blocks.
“I mean, he’s 7-4,” Gafford said. “I’m going against a lot of tall guys in my lifetime, but it’s like going against somebody like him, it’s like, man, you got to really be locked in and paying attention to detail and really ready to kind of go through his chest when it comes to playing against him.”
“Because, I mean, he is tall, and it’s like he holds his hands up, it’s right there at the rim,” Gafford continued. “Trust me, he got one of mine tonight, and I never had my shot blocked like that before.”
Gafford had scored 6 points across the first two games combined. He yelled toward the crowd after one of his second-quarter dunks.
“It felt good, ’cause I finally got me a dunk in the game,” Gafford said. “I finally got my legs back, I would say. But other than that, I mean, it just feels good that we’re building that chemistry down the stretch, especially down throughout the season. It’s gonna be plays like that, and it’s gonna just be bread and butter for us.”
Wembanyama also blocked 2 of de Larrea’s shots, a driving layup in the second quarter and a three in the fourth.
“I think we had a clear idea of what scouting was about him. I think we played well against him. Maybe the first [half] was better, we had a better start,” de Larrea said in Spanish. “In the end, he’s a player who’s very big and has a lot of skills. We have tried to minimize it as much as possible. In the attack, we are trying to find his weaknesses, which are few, to try to be the most effective in those weaknesses that he has.”
Dallas trailed by double digits over the final 6:31. San Antonio made 6 of 12 threes in the fourth quarter.
“I think it was a good experience, despite the result,” de Larrea said. “I think we could have polished some things and been more in the game in the last five minutes. But above all, what I learned is the, how to manage the minutes, how to manage the opponents, maybe know the players better, shooters, non-scorers, to make better rotations.”
“And then in the attack, I think that at certain moments we have been very good, in other moments perhaps a bit unwell,” de Larrea continued. “So that’s what you have to learn and improve and get better every day.”
Back-To-Back Workload, Billy Donovan Connection, And What’s Next For Mavericks
Washington played 36:09 on the second night of the back-to-back, and Risacher, de Larrea, and Sasser each played more than 26 minutes. Gafford said guys probably did not get to sleep until 3 or 4 a.m. after the flight home from Indianapolis.
“I wouldn’t say it gives us confidence, honestly,” Gafford said. “So back to back, we had a pretty good win last night, had a flight, came in. … Wake up and get right back to it. That shows a lot, and every team does that. And the Spurs did that too, and they just had a little bit more left over [in the] tank, I feel like.”
May was on the Florida staff that replaced Billy Donovan, now in his first season as San Antonio’s lead assistant under Spurs coach Mitch Johnson. May said he knows Donovan’s entire family.
“Very excited for him to be in this new chapter, and what a testament to his lack of ego to go back and be an assistant after being such a successful head coach as long as he has,” May said. “He’s one of the best that I’ve been around.”
Dallas visits the Miami Heat on Monday at Kaseya Center, with tip-off set for 6:30 p.m. CT on NBA TV. San Antonio hosts the Sacramento Kings on Tuesday, and the Mavericks and Spurs meet again Nov. 4 in San Antonio.
