{"id":675372,"date":"2026-03-23T23:15:11","date_gmt":"2026-03-23T23:15:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/675372\/"},"modified":"2026-03-23T23:15:11","modified_gmt":"2026-03-23T23:15:11","slug":"nba-lottery-watch-march-madness-for-the-mavericks","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/675372\/","title":{"rendered":"NBA Lottery Watch: March Madness for the Mavericks"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1nfb3k4i _16w9vov1 _16w9vov0 ls9zuh1\">Don\u2019t tell anyone we told you, but you\u2019d be forgiven if you missed some Dallas Mavericks games lately with <a href=\"https:\/\/www.mavsmoneyball.com\/mavericks-draft-rumors-news\/56879\/nba-draft-prospects-with-the-most-to-prove-in-march-madness-west-region-darius-acuff-aj-dybantsa\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">March Madness seeping through the public consciousness<\/a> for the last 96 hours. But both worlds work hand-in-hand, as the Mavericks navigate lottery positioning while the NBA season comes to a close.<\/p>\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1nfb3k4i _16w9vov1 _16w9vov0 ls9zuh1\">And while positioning (losing) doesn\u2019t sound so exciting, there are still some wild swings that could take place as a group of four teams between the fifth and eighth spots cluster closer and closer. The Utah Jazz, New Orleans Pelicans, and Memphis Grizzlies keep <a href=\"https:\/\/www.mavsmoneyball.com\/general\/57151\/the-mavericks-are-racing-to-the-bottom-and-its-hard-to-not-feel-disappointed\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">pacing around this liminal space of the back part of the top ten with the Mavericks<\/a>. Here at Lottery Watch we\u2019re taking a weekly pulse of what may have changed and what\u2019s up next.<\/p>\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1nfb3k4i _16w9vov1 _16w9vov0 ls9zuh1\">After the Mavericks sort of inexplicably beat the Cleveland Cavaliers just over a week ago, on the road no less, they dropped three straight last week and find themselves precariously in sixth place \u2014 two games back of the Jazz in fifth, and 1.5 games ahead of the Grizzlies and Pelicans. Those slim margins are of note because the swing from sixth to eighth means a 10-percent shift in a shot at a top four pick.<\/p>\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1nfb3k4i _16w9vov1 _16w9vov0 ls9zuh1\">To make it just a little stressful, the Mavericks do have the fourth toughest remaining schedule in the league. But those pesky Grizzlies have the second toughest. The one relief is knowing the Pelicans, who owe their unprotected pick to the Atlanta Hawks, have zero incentive to lose.<\/p>\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1nfb3k4i _16w9vov1 _16w9vov0 ls9zuh1\">Each week we\u2019ll take one spin around the block at <a href=\"https:\/\/tankathon.com\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">tankathon.com<\/a> and see where the chips fall. In a chilling turn of the simulator, this our fifth edition, the Atlanta Hawks for the fifth time in a row jump to the number one overall pick. There is voodoo in this simulation.<\/p>\n<p class=\"duet--article--dangerously-set-cms-markup duet--article--standard-paragraph _1nfb3k4i _16w9vov1 _16w9vov0 ls9zuh1\">The Mavericks slide back a spot for the first time in several weeks. If you\u2019re watching close to mock drafts across the internet, this puts them right on the fringes of that second tier behind the consensus top three. This paints a picture of both why the positioning is so vital \u2014 not because it ensures jumping up, but protects them if\/when they slide back.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Don\u2019t tell anyone we told you, but you\u2019d be forgiven if you missed some Dallas Mavericks games lately&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":672108,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3795],"tags":[7,294,1320,293,177,4070,6],"class_list":{"0":"post-675372","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-memphis-grizzlies","8":"tag-basketball","9":"tag-grizzlies","10":"tag-mavericks-news","11":"tag-memphis","12":"tag-memphis-grizzlies","13":"tag-memphisgrizzlies","14":"tag-nba"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/116281037858215503","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/675372","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=675372"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/675372\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/672108"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=675372"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=675372"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=675372"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}