Luka Doncic and the Dallas Mavericks have a marquee matchup coming up on Wednesday night against the third-seeded Sacramento Kings. It should have been a big game for the Mavs, who should have still been chasing a spot in the Play-In tournament out West, but at this point, this just isn't going to be the case. Mathematically speaking, Dallas still has a shot of entering the Top 10 in the conference with three games remaining, but realistically speaking, their season is now all but over.

In an interview ahead of Wednesday's clash against the Kings, a seemingly dejected Luka Doncic was asked about what he feels he can work on in his game to be even better than he already is. It was at this point that the Mavs superstar revealed the harsh reality he's living in right now:

“I've been playing basketball for three straight years, maybe four weeks in between it was free,” Doncic said. “Sometimes it's really hard for me to play really hard on both ends. But obviously, the defensive end I gotta be way better.”

Luka did acknowledge that he needs to work on his defense, but he did seem to imply that he's already doing all the heavy lifting on the offensive end for the Mavs. Doncic has also pointed to fatigue as a major factor in his deficiencies on the defensive end, which in truth, has to be hard to hear for the Dallas faithful. Nevertheless, it does sound like Luka is making excuses here as his defense continues to be a major chink in his armor.

Barring a seemingly miraculous turn of events in the final week of the regular season, it's going to be back to the drawing for the Mavs in what is going to be a very interesting summer for them.