Shai Gilgeous-Alexander and Chet Holmgren have done plenty to help the Oklahoma City Thunder to a 3-0 start to the season.
But with Jalen Williams still out following offseason wrist surgery, second-year reserve shooting guard Ajay Mitchell is having a big impact as well.
Mitchell and Oklahoma City will try to continue their success to start the season when they wrap up a three-game road trip Monday against the Dallas Mavericks.
Mitchell averaged 6.5 points and 1.8 assists in 36 games as a rookie, not scoring more than 17 in a game.
The sample size remains small, but he’s averaging 18.7 points and 4.3 assists through the Thunder’s hot start. He hasn’t scored fewer than 14 points and has just one turnover in 81 minutes of action.
“When you’re playing with him, it’s like a pickup game,” Gilgeous-Alexander said of Mitchell. “He doesn’t need a play called for him. He doesn’t need too much structure. He just goes out there, figures out a way, makes the right basketball play, plays hard and wins.”
The Mavericks were one of the few teams to have success against the Thunder last regular season, taking three of the four meetings.
For Dallas, Monday’s game is the second of a back-to-back while Oklahoma City is on the first night of a back-to-back.
The Mavericks picked up their first win of the season, beating the Raptors 139-129 in Dallas on Sunday.
Monday’s matchup will be the first for Cooper Flagg, the top pick in this year’s NBA draft, against the defending champions.
Flagg, at 18 years and 309 days old, became the fifth-youngest player in league history to score 20 or more points with his 22-point, four-rebound, four-assist, no-turnover performance.
“He’s relentless,” Mavericks guard D’Angelo Russell said of Flagg. “He’s nonstop. His motor is nonstop, offensively, defensively.”
After the Mavericks’ 0-2 start to begin the season, and now after his team’s first win, Flagg is trying to stay even-keeled.
“Just making plays, just impacting the game, not forcing anything but just taking what is there,” Flagg said. “Always staying with it, always staying positive.”
Dallas coach Jason Kidd is looking to do the same as he leads a team that remains in transition after last season’s trade of Luka Doncic for Anthony Davis and the offseason roster changes that included drafting Flagg.
“You gotta live with mistakes,” Kidd said. “There’s no perfect player, no perfect game. As much as we’ll get critiqued on that, we don’t really care.
“We gotta be able to go through the fire to be a champion.”
Holmgren (lower back soreness) is questionable for Oklahoma City while guards Alex Caruso (concussion), Isaiah Joe (knee) and Williams remain out.
Holmgren was questionable with the same issue for Saturday’s game at Atlanta but wound up leading the Thunder with 31 points in that 117-100 victory. He also suffered a dislocated thumb during that game but returned after the injury.
Mavericks guard Brandon Williams missed Sunday’s game for personal reasons, while forward Daniel Gafford is approaching a return from a right ankle sprain that has kept him out for the first three games.