Portland Trail Blazers vs. Dallas Mavericks Prediction, Preview, Picks & Odds - 4/8/2022

Time: 8:30 p.m. ET

Venue: American Airlines Center, Dallas, TX

Where to watch: Bally Sports Southwest-Dallas, ROOT-SP

DraftKings: Mavs -18

BetMGM: Mavs -17.5

Caesars: Mavs -18

Blazers: 27-52

Mavs: 50-30

The Dallas Mavericks are a 50-win team for the first time since Dirk Nowitzki was still carrying this damn team across the finish line into the playoffs. Now Luka Doncic knows exactly what that feels like. I sort of joke about this, but things were bleak once upon a time.

At time of publishing, the Mavs are still sitting at the No. 4 seed in the Western Conference. By the time you read this, either the Los Angeles Lakers without their big three have or have not defeated the Golden State Warriors to push the Mavs to the No. 3 spot. Watch the Lakers blow this because things are evil in this world.

But the Mavs essentially have a chance to control their own destiny in these final two games, starting with a home meeting against the Portland Trail Blazers on Friday. The Mavs will close the regular season with two home games before unleashing Playoff Luka on the world.

The Mavs are coming off a 131-113 win over the Detroit Pistons on Wednesday that brought Dallas to the 50-win mark. Luka did his thing yet again with 26 points, 14 assists and eight rebounds in a relatively easy night of work. Jalen Brunson finished with 24 points as the Mavs had six players in double figures.

"It's a great accomplishment," coach Jason Kidd said of his group reaching 50 wins for the first time in seven years. "The guys in that locker room can't take that lightly because it's not easy to do."

Not to mention, the Mavs are 20 games above .500 for the first time since they won the championship in 2011 when Kidd was the point guard for that team. If you haven’t felt old yet, hopefully that did it for you just now.

"I think it's pretty impressive," Doncic said. "We started the season kind of slow. I'm proud of how we played and hopefully we get to 52 (wins)."

We talked the other day about Dallas being that team that no one wants to face, especially if Doncic gets hot in the playoffs which he’s shown to do. The Mavs also have a much better cast around Doncic than in prior years, and the team has bought in to Kidd’s defensive-first coaching style. Imagine Rick Carlisle coaching defense. Poor man has not been able to get out of the hell that is Indiana and will be stuck there for quite a while.

There’s not much really on the Blazers to this point. They’ve lost eight in a row after falling 98-94 in Oklahoma City on Tuesday night. The long-standing nightmare without Damian Lillard is almost nearing its end.

Portland led by 19 at one point in this game and lost. That sounds about right at this point. Ben McLemore had 17 points. Portland is just bad.

"Momentum is everything in this league, and the minute you let off the gas or become a little complacent, a team can take advantage of you," Blazers coach Chauncey Billups said. "You've got a lot of hungry guys out there on their team that's in similar position to our guys. They don't get a chance to play that much. So when they do, they want to take advantage of it, and they were just hungrier than we were in the fourth quarter."

Should the Mavs play a solid game through two quarters, it should be over by halftime. There’s no reason for Dallas to use up its energy for this game when there’s a more important matchup that awaits them next week. The Mavs should take care of business and handle this game easily. Mavs by 20

Blazers are 19-34 ATS as an underdog this season and 11-20 as a road dog.

Blazers are 16-8 ATS this season after failing to cover six or seven of their last eight.

Mavs are 205-144 ATS since 1996 after two straight non-conference games.

PG: Brandon Williams

SG: Keon Johnson

SF: CJ Elleby

PF: Greg Brown III

C: Drew Eubanks

PG: Luka Doncic

SG: Jalen Brunson

SF: Reggie Bullock

PF: Dorian Finney-Smith

C: Dwight Powell

Blazers: Damian Lillard (abdomen, out), Jusuf Nurkic (foot, out), Anfernee Simons (quad, out), Josh Hart (knee, out), Eric Bledsoe (Achilles, out), Joe Ingles (ACL, out)

Mavs: Maxi Kleber (ankle, questionable), Tim Hardaway Jr. (foot, out)

Points: Damian Lillard -- 24.0

Rebounds: Jusuf Nurkic -- 11.1

Assists: Damian Lillard -- 7.3

Points: Luka Doncic -- 28.3

Rebounds: Luka Doncic -- 9.1

Assists: Luka Doncic -- 8.8