The Dallas Mavericks took home a 121-116 win over Memphis on Tuesday night, which combined with the Phoenix Suns only beating the San Antonio Spurs by 11 points, was enough to get the Mavericks through to the knockout rounds of the NBA Cup as the wild card from the Western Conference. Going into the night, Houston and Golden State were the most likely teams to take the number one seed in the west, but they both lost in their final group stage game, which sent OKC to the one seed based off of their top point differential. Now that the matchups are set, what exactly happens from here?

The knockout rounds, explained

In both the Eastern & Western Conference, the four advancing teams are reseeded one through four. The three group winners are the top seeds, while the wild card in each conference is the fourth seed. The one seed hosts the four seed, while the two seed hosts the three seed. The winners of those games will match up against each other in the NBA Cup semifinals on December 14th in Las Vegas, while the losers will match up against each other on either December 15th or 16th. The NBA Cup championship game will take place on December 17th, once again in Las Vegas. That game will not count towards the regular season records of either team, as it is the 83rd scheduled game for both. However, the prior two games will count, as these are scheduled games 81 & 82. The winning team’s players will each receive a $500k cash bonus for winning the Cup.

The bracket

We’ve got a highly competitive bracket on both sides, featuring each of the top three seeds in the West & seeds three through six in the East. In the West, OKC will host the Mavs on Tuesday, December 10th at 8:30p, while Houston will host the Warriors on the 11th. In the East, top seed Milwaukee will host the wild card Magic on Tuesday in the game preceding OKC/Dallas, while 2nd seed New York will host the suddenly surging Atlanta Hawks on the 11th.

DraftKings Sportsbook lookahead lines for the NBA Cup Quarterfinals

Orlando Magic (+5) vs Milwaukee Bucks (o/u 216.5) – 12/10 6:00p

Dallas Mavericks (+5) vs OKC Thunder (o/u 227.5) – 12/10 8:30p

Atlanta Hawks (+8.5) vs New York Knicks (o/u 234) – 12/11 6:00p

Golden State Warriors (+3) vs Houston Rockets (o/u 223.5) – 12/11 8:30p

The road ahead

Looking ahead schedule-wise, it is simple for the Mavericks. Win against the Thunder, and they’ll punch their ticket to Vegas for the semi’s. If the Mavericks were to lose to OKC, their 82nd scheduled game would be slightly more complicated. Dallas would either host Houston or go on the road to the Warriors, depending on the result of their game. Even though both teams are higher seeds than Dallas, it is written into the Cup rules that a team can’t host back-to-back games after group play. Therefore, Dallas would host Houston. Since Golden State is on the road, they would host Dallas based off of being the higher Cup seed.

Before that, however, it is important that Dallas take care of business against the teams that they should beat. The Mavs goes on the road to face the Washington Wizards and Toronto Raptors over the next few days, where they’ll be heavy favorites to win both games. The Mavs have shown the ability to keep their mind on the business at hand, but that’ll be tested once again.

Given how much resistance there has been to the NBA Cup from fans and teams alike, it’s fun to see the Mavericks in the hunt for winning it. While things are certainly convoluted and manufactured to a degree, Dallas is here now. It will be a treat to see the Mavericks play in high stakes games before the calendar rolls over to 2025.