{"id":128709,"date":"2025-03-15T07:39:14","date_gmt":"2025-03-15T11:39:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/?p=128709"},"modified":"2025-03-15T07:39:14","modified_gmt":"2025-03-15T11:39:14","slug":"dante-exum-injury","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/2025\/03\/15\/dante-exum-injury\/","title":{"rendered":"The Mavericks Never-Ending Injury List Continues To Grow"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The Dallas Mavericks, fresh off an NBA Finals appearance, were expected to be a formidable team again this season. A starting lineup of <a  href=\"https:\/\/www.basketball-reference.com\/players\/d\/doncilu01.html\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Luka Doncic<\/a>, <a  href=\"https:\/\/www.basketball-reference.com\/players\/i\/irvinky01.html\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Kyrie Irving<\/a>, <a  href=\"https:\/\/www.basketball-reference.com\/players\/t\/thompkl01.html\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Klay Thompson<\/a>, <a  href=\"https:\/\/www.basketball-reference.com\/players\/w\/washipj01.html\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">P.J. Washington<\/a>, and <a  href=\"https:\/\/www.basketball-reference.com\/players\/l\/livelde01.html\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Dereck Lively II<\/a> could be rivaled by few. Key reserves such as <a  href=\"https:\/\/www.basketball-reference.com\/players\/g\/gaffoda01.html\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Daniel Gafford<\/a>, <a  href=\"https:\/\/www.basketball-reference.com\/players\/g\/grimequ01.html\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Quentin Grimes<\/a>, and <a  href=\"https:\/\/www.basketball-reference.com\/players\/e\/exumda01.html\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Dante Exum<\/a> gave them solid depth. Out of those eight names, seven are not around due to injury or being traded. Dante Exum saw his name added to the <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/2025\/03\/13\/mavericks-injury-news-returning-players-anthony-davis\/\" target=\"_self\">Mavericks ever-growing injury report<\/a>, and Dallas won\u2019t be seeing him play anytime soon.<\/p>\n<h2>The Mavericks Never-Ending Injury List Continues To Grow<\/h2>\n<h3>Dante Exum Injury Just Another One Sustained By A Mavericks Player<\/h3>\n<p>The <a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/2025\/03\/10\/mavericks-jason-kidd-team-injuries\/\" target=\"_self\">Mavericks can\u2019t catch a break<\/a>. Now some of it is self-inflicted. The Doncic trade has been talked about ad nauseam though, so it won\u2019t be discussed here.<\/p>\n<p>On Friday, Dallas was blown out by the score of 133-96 at the hands of the Houston Rockets. The loss dropped the Mavericks to 33-35, as they have struggled to find enough quality healthy players of late.<\/p>\n<p>They will be down another player though as their nightmarish last month-plus continues. In the game against Houston, guard Dante Exum left the game in the second quarter with a left hand injury. That hand has a broken bone in it, which in all likelihood will end the 29-year-old\u2019s season prematurely.<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-width=\"550\" data-dnt=\"true\">\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">Yet another injury hit for Dallas: Mavericks guard Dante Exum has suffered a broken bone in his left hand, sources tell ESPN. Exum is now out indefinitely. <a  href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/7D2S0NNjUM\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">pic.twitter.com\/7D2S0NNjUM<\/a><\/p>\n<p>&mdash; Shams Charania (@ShamsCharania) <a  href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/ShamsCharania\/status\/1900725000853758105?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">March 15, 2025<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<p>It hadn\u2019t been too long ago that Exum returned from a previous injury. The 6-foot-5 guard missed the first 48 games of the season with a fractured right hand, giving him two major injuries, one to each hand, this season.<\/p>\n<p>This is Exum\u2019s second season with the team after he rejoined the NBA in 2023-24 following two years playing overseas. It was a nice story seeing Exum return after the fifth overall pick in the 2014 NBA Draft was seen as somewhat of a draft bust. In his 18 outings this season, Exum has averaged 9.1 points, 1.7 rebounds, and 2.8 assists in 19.1 minutes. He has shot 48.0% from the field, 44.7% from beyond the arc, and 74.2% from the free-throw line.<\/p>\n<h3>Chances Of Reaching Play-In Tournament Dwindling By The Day<\/h3>\n<p>The Mavericks entered Friday\u2019s game against Houston with only nine available bodies to play. After Exum\u2019s injury, they exited with just eight.<\/p>\n<p>With how injury-ravaged their roster has become, it is hard to see how they can hold on to the 10th seed they currently hold and an appearance in the Play-In Tournament. Dallas has now lost seven of their last eight contests. Since a 20-11 start, they are 13-24 since.<\/p>\n<p>While the Phoenix Suns aren\u2019t exactly playing inspired basketball, they are at least far more healthy than the Mavericks. On Friday, the Suns were able to earn a victory over the Sacramento Kings. That allowed them to move to within 1.5 games of Dallas for the last Play-In Tournament position.<\/p>\n<p>The Mavericks next play on Sunday against the Philadelphia 76ers, certainly another struggling team with numerous key injuries. Dallas has 14 games remaining, and with the amount of injuries they have sustained, it\u2019s hard to foresee many future wins. It\u2019s been quite the precipitous fall for the reigning Western Conference champions.<\/p>\n<p>Photo credit: \u00a9 Daniel Dunn-Imagn Images<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Dallas Mavericks, fresh off an NBA Finals appearance, were expected to be a formidable team again this season. A starting lineup of Luka Doncic, Kyrie Irving, Klay Thompson, P.J. Washington, and Dereck Lively II could be rivaled by few. Key reserves such as Daniel Gafford, Quentin Grimes, and Dante Exum gave them solid depth. [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5060,"featured_media":128727,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"no","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1608,30,62,3],"tags":[402,4745],"class_list":["post-128709","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-basketball","category-mavericks","category-nba","category-news","tag-dante-exum","tag-nba-injuries"],"modified_by":"Kenny Kluska","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/128709","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5060"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=128709"}],"version-history":[{"count":17,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/128709\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":128729,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/128709\/revisions\/128729"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/128727"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=128709"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=128709"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=128709"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}