The Dallas Mavericks and Sacramento Kings will play each other in the Western Conference play-in on April 16. As the No. 9 seed, the Kings will have homecourt advantage. The Mavericks also don’t have Kyrie Irving, which puts them at a talent disadvantage.
However, it is kind of hard to gauge this matchup because both teams underwent some major overhauls over the course of the 2024-25 season. Their makeups were much different from when they first matched up to when they last matched up.
With their play-in game happening in a couple of days, here’s their head-to-head record against each other and who made themselves stand out in their matchups.
Mavericks Beat Kings in All Three Matchups
The Kings were 3-0 against the Mavericks this season. However, it’s fair to say that even though the Mavericks were swept, that may not necessarily mean this is going to be an easy one. That’s because of the personnel in each team that they would go on to trade away.
Dallas technically had Luka Dončić in their first matchup on December 30, 2024, but he was out due to injury. It was the same thing for Irving, as the Kings won 110-100. Irving was in the next matchup on February 10, 2025, in which the Mavericks barely lost 129-128. Anthony Davis didn’t play, as he had suffered an adductor strain.
The Kings blew out the Mavericks in their final matchup 122-98. Neither Irving nor Davis were present for that one.
In all fairness, the Kings, too, went through some major changes mid-season, effectively replacing De’Aaron Fox and Kevin Huerter with Zach LaVine and Jonas Valanciunas at the trade deadline.
The Standout Performances in Mavericks vs. Kings
It’s not worth bringing up Irving’s performances for the Mavericks because he’s not going to play. Davis can’t be brought up either because he didn’t play in either of the games the two teams faced each other because he was hurt.
The Mavericks’ biggest standout performance in their first matchup against the Kings came from PJ Washington, who scored 28 points, four three-pointers, and two blocks.
Helping him along the way was Spencer Dinwiddie, who scored 30 points and dished six assists.
Dinwiddie put on a pretty good show in their next matchup, scoring 20 points to go with five assists. Past that, the Mavericks got some solid production from unlikely names like Naji Marshall, who put up 18 in the final matchup, and Olivier-Maxence Prosper, who put up 18 points in their second.
On the Kings’ side, they definitely had bigger standout performances. The biggest performer in their first game came from Fox. In their second matchup, DeMar DeRozan put on a show. He put up a season-high of 42 points on 15-for-22 shooting, demonstrating how much juice he still has left.
After that, no one on the Kings really made themselves stand out. Domantas Sabonis put up double-doubles in every matchup, but scoring-wise, they were pretty ho-hum for someone like him. His rebound totals were 16, then 15, as he didn’t play in their final matchup.
In a way, this makes their upcoming matchup all the more exciting to see how Davis’ presence will change both the Kings and Mavericks on both sides of the floor.