Doncic remained humbled when asked about his MVP status.
Luka Doncic dropped 42 points and 12 assists on Tuesday night as the Los Angeles Lakers cruised past the Cleveland Cavaliers 127-113, and when reporters asked him afterward to make his case for the MVP award, he wasn't interested in playing that game.
"I mean, I never did that, so I'm not the one voting," Doncic said. "But I think I've been playing pretty good, we've been winning, so that's it. That's all I got to say."
A Statement Win Over Cleveland
It was another dominant night from the Lakers' superstar, who went 13-of-26 from the floor and added five rebounds and two steals in just 34 minutes of work.
The win was the Lakers' fourth straight and pushed them to 50-26 on the season, good for third in the Western Conference.
The Cavaliers, sitting at 47-29 in the Eastern Conference, had no answers for Doncic once he got rolling, and the Lakers led by as many as 27 in the third quarter before Cleveland made the final score a little more respectable.
Doncic came back from a one-game suspension he served Monday against Washington due to technical foul accumulation, and he looked like a guy who had too much energy saved up.
His season averages of 33.7 points, 7.8 rebounds and 8.2 assists make him the league's leading scorer and one of only a handful of players in history to sustain that kind of all-around production over a full year.
And this month in particular has been something else entirely, with Doncic averaging 37.2 points per game in March while the Lakers went 15-2.
Why It Still Might Not Be Enough
Here's the thing, though. As good as Doncic has been, and as loud as his numbers and his teammates have been on his behalf, the MVP race is stacked against him.
Shai Gilgeous-Alexander is the reigning winner and his Oklahoma City Thunder own the best record in basketball by a wide margin.
SGA is averaging 31.6 points, 4.4 rebounds and 6.5 assists while leading a team that's on pace for over 60 wins, and voters tend to reward the best player on the best team.
Victor Wembanyama has also surged into the conversation with his two-way dominance in San Antonio, which makes the path even harder for Doncic.
Lakers coach JJ Redick has been openly stumping for Doncic to win the award, and teammates like Rui Hachimura have called him the MVP without hesitation.
But Doncic himself has taken a quieter approach, letting his performances do the talking rather than lobbying the media.
The numbers back up Doncic's case as well as anyone's.
He leads the league in scoring, has 16 games of 40 or more points this season, and just became the third-youngest player in NBA history to reach 15,000 career points.
The Lakers have looked like a completely different team when he's at his best, winning 13 of their last 14 heading into Tuesday and clinching the Pacific Division title that same night.
But the Thunder sitting 10 games clear of the Lakers in the standings is hard for voters to ignore, and Gilgeous-Alexander's efficiency on both ends of the floor gives him an edge that raw scoring totals can't quite close.