Moussa Cisse's Minutes Jump 12.0 a Night
Cisse is playing nearly twice the minutes he logged all season, and the next five games decide if that holds.
Moussa Cisse is averaging 26.0 minutes a night over his last 5 games. That is 12.0 more than his season mark of 13.9 minutes, across 38 games in 2025-26, through April 12.
A jump of that size in such a short window says the Mavericks found a reason to trust Cisse with real minutes down the stretch. Minutes are the clearest signal a coach gives. Points can lag behind opportunity, and Cisse's season scoring average, 4.5 points, has not caught up yet to the role he is now playing.
For this to hold, the Mavericks need to keep leaning on him the same way over the next several games, not just for a short stretch tied to matchups or absences elsewhere on the roster. If his minutes slide back toward the 13.9 season average, the last five games will read as a blip, not a change in how the team sees him.
The number to watch is simple: does Cisse keep getting 26 minutes a night, or does he slide back down. Five games is enough to notice. It is not enough to call it a new role. The next stretch of games will say which one it actually is.