Kristaps Porzingis had just four points on 1-of-11 shooting in 20 minutes during a Dallas Mavericks loss at the Boston Celtics in which he was benched for the final nine minutes of the game after picking up his fifth foul.
"There's nights like this," Rick Carlisle said. "We're just going to flush it and move forward."
Porzingis has struggled to begin his career with the Mavericks after re-signing on a five-year, $158 million contract in July.
"Of course I want to be out there, but can't blame him," Porzingis said. "I wasn't having a great game. I'm all-in for whatever's best for the team. If the coach thinks he'd rather have me out and have someone else in that's having a better game, let's do it if we can win a basketball game. That's the most important thing, but going forward, I want to make sure I'm out there."
Porzingis is averaging 18.3 points on 40.1% shooting from the floor in nine games for the Mavs.
"Sometimes I'm not going to get the ball as much as I'd like to, and that leads to me maybe forcing some things and so on," Porzingis said. "It's a work in progress. I know Coach is trying to do the best job he can to get me the ball in the offense and utilize my skills, and I also got to do a better job of making sure I'm effective in those situations."
