As spectacular a player as Luka Doncic is, he's far from flawless. The Dallas Mavericks superstar has been known to incessantly complain to game officials when calls don't go his way.
That side of him has reared its ugly head again this season, as Luka Doncic tallied his 14th technical foul of the season in a frustrating blowout loss at home against the New York Knicks on Wednesday night.
That puts him dangerously close to the 16-tech threshold that would constitute an automatic one-game suspension.
Via Brad Townsend:
Doncic says of a suspension: “It won’t happen.” He added: “And I’m going to, how you say, challenge this one, too. It’s crazy.”
The Mavs have 16 games left in the season. Doncic through the first 66 games has garnered a technical once every five games. He'll have to exercise caution and let cooler heads prevail to make sure he doesn't incur that suspension in the home stretch.
Article Continues BelowMavs head coach Jason Kidd isn't too worried. With one technical of cushion still standing between his superstar and a suspension, he has faith that Doncic won't let it get to that point.
“How many does he have?” Kidd asked. Told that Doncic has 14, Kidd said, “oh, there's room for error. He'll be fine.”
With Dallas in the thick of a heated playoff positioning, missing Luka Doncic for one game could be the difference between home-court advantage or potentially falling into the play-in tournament, depending on how things shake out. They're currently just one game behind the 4th seeded Utah Jazz and just two and a half games ahead of the 7th seeded Minnesota Timberwolves, who have now won six games in a row.
While it all could end up being a non-issue down the line, Mavs fans would rather not tempt fate and have Luka Doncic for the rest of the way.