In the NBA, respect between opponents is often more noticeable than the scoreboard. Before the preseason meeting between the Los Angeles Lakers and the Dallas Mavericks, two of the league’s superstars — the Mavs’ point guard Luka Doncic and the Lakers’ forward-center Anthony Davis — traded jokes and firm handshakes. A brief conversation, smiles, and friendly encouragement set a calm, sportingly warm tone for the evening, which nevertheless ended with a confident Dallas win — 121:94.
Smiles Before the Opening Tip
The stars’ exchange happened during warmups: light conversation, gestures of support — and not a hint of tension. For the league, such episodes are a marker of culture: top-tier players remember that the rivalry begins after the opening tip, and before it there is room for mutual respect and human connection. Fans got images that remind us the NBA is also a community where leaders set standards of conduct.
Different Tasks for the Night: Doncic’s Rest and Davis’s On-Court Work
The Slovenian point guard sat out for a classic preseason reason — a back-to-back. In the preseason, coaching staffs strictly manage workloads, and a night off after the previous game is part of smart management. For Dallas, this is not a red flag but an investment in the long haul of the regular season: keeping the leader’s legs and back fresh matters more than an experiment for a single October game.
Anthony Davis, by contrast, logged a hefty “preseason dose” — 30 minutes on the floor. For the Lakers, it was a working session for pace and contact: finding rhythm, polishing two-big lineups and pick-and-rolls, and refreshing weak-side actions. When a forward-center plays that kind of stretch in the preseason, it reads as the final tune-up of conditioning before the main part of the schedule.
The Preseason Is About Process, Not the Score
The 94:121 final looks stark, but in October the observations matter more than the numbers. The Mavericks confirmed their rotation depth: even without their lead ball-handler, ball movement and tempo held up, and the second unit executed their roles with confidence. The Lakers, by contrast, were testing combinations and defensive principles, where the price of a mistake is merely more film to study, not a lost place in the standings. That’s the point of the preseason: fine-tuning, load management, trying new pairings, and expanding the playbook.
Star Etiquette and Hierarchy: Why These Moments Matter
Doncic and Davis are the faces of franchises around whom multi-year strategies are built. Their public gestures of respect transmit values down the roster and into the stands. For young players, the lesson is simple: ‘Be tough in the game, be courteous outside it.’ For the league, it’s a strong image signal: competitiveness doesn’t cancel respect for an opponent and for the craft.
Load Management as Part of a Bigger Strategy
A back-to-back is a test even for a young body, all the more so for players with substantial international and playoff mileage. Doncic’s rest is part of Dallas’s long-term strategy to reduce peak-load risks and prevent micro-injuries. Davis’s minutes are the flip side of the same coin: the Lakers are addressing questions of game sharpness so they can enter the regular season without excessive “ramping up” in November.
What Remains After the Final Buzzer
The score goes into the stats, while the story of the night goes into the chronicle of good habits: pregame smiles, smart, managed workload, and respect for the profession and the opponent. The preseason takeaways are straightforward: the Mavericks convincingly showcased their system, and the Lakers got 30 minutes of quality work from their leader at real game speed. And the audience got a rare snapshot where two NBA superstars remind us that sport is not only a battle for possession but also a culture of relationships that makes you want to watch that battle all winter and spring.
