Slovenia vs. Team USA: Big Luka Injury Update

Dallas Mavericks star Luka Doncic won’t get to play for Slovenia against Team USA in Saturday’s FIBA World Cup preparation game.

Dalton Trigg | Aug 12, 2023

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Dallas Mavericks

Although most of the Dallas Mavericks' focus has been on Dirk Nowitzki's Hall of Fame ceremony, which will commence on Saturday night, their current superstar, Luka Doncic, was initially scheduled to have a big game earlier in the same day.

In preparation for the FIBA World Cup, Slovenia will be taking on former Mavs guard Jalen Brunson and Team USA in an exhibition game later today. Team USA is coming off a 117-74 blowout win over Puerto Rico, and Slovenia is coming off a 104-100 win over Montenegro, where Doncic tallied a 34-point, 13-rebound, 14-assist triple-double.

DallasBasketball.com conducted a poll earlier this week asking American Mavs fans who they would be rooting for most between Team USA and Slovenia. A whopping 74.1 percent of those fans voted for Slovenia, while the remaining 25.9 percent chose Team USA.

Here's everything you need to know about the Saturday afternoon friendly match:

When: Saturday, August 12, 2:30 p.m. CT | Where: Palacio de Deportes Maria Martin Carpena (Malaga, Spain) | TV: FS1 | Live Streaming: Courtside 1891 (World Cup games will be available on ESPN+, but they aren't for these friendly matches, unfortunately).

Injury Update: Luka Doncic is OUT on the second night of a back-to-back for precautionary reasons … an unfortunate, but understandable situation, as Slovenia wants him to be 100 percent for the actual World Cup games.

Prediction: Red, white and blue… by a lot.

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Published Aug 12, 2023

DALTON TRIGG

Dalton Trigg is the Editor-In-Chief for Dallas Basketball, as well as the Executive Editor overseeing Inside The Rockets, Inside The Spurs, All Knicks, and The Magic Insider. He is the founder and host for the Mavs Step Back Podcast, which is a proud part of the Blue Wire podcast network. Trigg graduated from the University of Southern Mississippi’s College of Business and Economic Development with a bachelor’s degree in entrepreneurship in 2016. After spending a few years with multiple Dallas Mavericks-related blogs, including SB Nation’s Mavs Moneyball, Trigg joined DallasBasketball.com as a staff writer in 2018 and never looked back. At the start of 2022, he was promoted to the EIC title he holds now. Through the years, Trigg has conducted a handful of high-profile one-on-one interviews to add to his resume — in both writing and podcasting. Some of his biggest interviews have been with Mavs owner Mark Cuban, Mavs GM Nico Harrison, now-retired legend Dirk Nowitzki and many other current/former players and team staffers. Many of those interviews and other articles by Trigg have been aggregated by other well-known sports media websites, such as Yahoo Sports, CBS Sports, Bleacher Report and others. You can find Trigg on all major social media channels, but his most prevalent platform is on Twitter. Whether it’s posting links to his DBcom work, live-tweeting Mavs games or merely giving his opinions on things going on with Dallas and the rest of the NBA, the daily content never stops rolling. For any inquiries, please email Dalton@MavsStepBack.com.