Jason Kidd Out After Five Seasons With Mavericks
jason kidd is out after five seasons with the Mavericks, ending a run that began in 2021 and included a surprise push to the Western Conference Finals in his first year. Dallas now moves on after a stretch that also reached the 2024 NBA Finals, then unraveled after the February 2025 Luka Dončić trade.
Kidd’s Dallas run
The Mavericks hired Kidd in 2021, and he immediately delivered a 52-30 season. That opening year ended with a surprise run to the Western Conference Finals, the clearest high point of his tenure.
Two years later, Dallas won the Western Conference and got to the NBA Finals. The Mavericks lost that series in six games to the Boston Celtics, then entered a far rougher stretch once the roster changed again.
February changed the roster
Dallas traded Luka Dončić to the Los Angeles Lakers in February 2025, a move that shifted the center of the franchise. Anthony Davis then suffered a left adductor strain in his first game with the Mavericks on Feb. 8, 2025, and Kyrie Irving tore the ACL in his left knee weeks later.
Anthony Davis and Irving played only 25 minutes together in Dallas before Davis was traded to the Washington Wizards in February. The Mavericks then lost 30 of 37 games to close the regular season, a collapse that left Kidd trying to explain a team that never stayed healthy long enough to settle in.
What Kidd said in April
After the regular-season finale against Chicago on April 12, Kidd said it was difficult to evaluate Dallas’ last two seasons because of injuries. He added, “We have to be healthy at some point.”
“We want that to be next season,” Kidd said. “If that is, we can be judged.”
Dallas had already blocked Kidd from interviewing with the New York Knicks last summer, and the team gave him a contract extension in October. Those moves made a split less obvious, but the ending now lands on a coach whose best Dallas moments came early and whose final stretch was shaped by a trade, injuries and a 30-loss finish over the last 37 games.
