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This was the Mavs’ year.
The team finally learned how to play defense, finishing the season as the seventh best team in the league at opponents points per game, allowing 93.07. Dallas finished sixth in the league at rebounds, at an impressive clip of 42.2 per game. Fourth at blocks, the Mavs’ most traditional front line in this era contributed to the team’s 5.95 per game. The Mavericks also held opponents to 44% shooting- not quite at Coach Avery Johnson’s 42% goal, but pretty good. Considering how the team played over the past half-decade under Don Nelson, utilizing small ball, outside shooting, and keeping up the pace to try and outscore the other team, Dallas’ improvement on the defensive end of the floor has been not only remarkable, but a shocker to most in the basketball world.
Despite the organization waiving second scorer Michael Finley with the amnesty clause, the offense has not skipped a beat. While the new emphasis on defense has certainly been prevalent, the Mavs have not lost their offensive identity, averaging 99.2 points per game, still in the NBA’s top ten, while shooting 46%.
After last season’s playoff disaster, many wondered whether the mentally instable Dirk Nowitzki would ever rise to superstar status. It seemed like, although he had a stellar regular season and earned his first All-NBA First Team bid, he was not a strong enough leader to take himself and his team to the next level. Every season before Dirk had raised his numbers in the postseason, but last year’s drop-off combined with him yelling at Jason Terry after a huge defensive lapse in Game 6 of the conference semifinals caused the big media and NBA brains to write him off.
This season, Dirk responded to his own frustration and possibly general disrespect towards him with the greatest season of his career. His numbers weren’t incredible, but Dirk obviously grew to become the leader and MVP of a championship-level team. I’m just saying his numbers weren’t incredible because of the caliber player Dirk has proven to be. All he did statswise was average career highs in points (26.6), field goal percentage (48%)), and free throw percentage (90%) all while grabbing 9 rebounds, 3 assists, and a block each game.
Virtually every other player on the team found his own niche as well. Josh Howard emerged as the clear-cut second-best player on the Mavericks, averaging a career-high15.6 points as well as 6.3 rebounds at the small forward position. Combo guard Jason Terry won several games with his clutch shooting, and finished the season averaging 17.1 points per game on 47% shooting with 41% from beyond the arc. Combine these roles with the clearly perfect roles for everyone from sixth man Jerry Stackhouse to third-string center DJ Mbenga, and you’ve got a 60-win team. Dallas’s 60-22 record, by the way, is tied for first in Mavericks history.
Of course, none of this could be achieved without Coach of the Year Avery Johnson. Johnson, who broke the record for most wins in a coach’s first full season with 66, is the sole reason the mentality of the Mavericks have changed so much. He has made too many amazing decisions as a young coach to list, including signing veteran guard Adrian Griffin off of his couch in Houston to provide a much-needed defensive specialist and starting third-year center DeSagana Diop, who could not even find minutes in big-man-depleted Cleveland. All of the players have “bought into Avery’s system” and that system has been extremely effective.
So, with all of this in play at the end of the regular season, it seemed like the Mavericks were ready for a long playoff run. There was an unspoken feeling in the locker room, in the American Airlines Center, in Dallas, on internet message boards, even in the national media that the Mavs could really do it. The Dallas Mavericks had, apparently, finally become an “elite” team, and the Larry O’Brien Trophy was theirs for their taking.
There were two reasons why this feeling was unspoken- the Detroit Pistons and the San Antonio Spurs. Both of the teams that faced off in the NBA Finals last year had not only remained the cream of the crop, they improved. The Pistons signed new coach Flip Saunders, and their offense rose almost to the level of their already-amazing defense. The defending champion Spurs felt they did not need to do much, except sign Michael Finley and former Mav playoff hero Nick Van Exel, and they finished the season with a franchise-best 63 wins.
The Mavs did not need worry about the Pistons until the fourth round of the playoffs, if they would reach that far, but the Spurs somehow seemed vulnerable. In one of the first games of the season, the Mavs spanked the Spurs by 19 points. The two regular season games they lost were close, and the Mavs proved that they could win a close game in San Antonio in April, a game that had major playoff implications at the time. Plus, Tim Duncan just hobbled through a less than par plantar fasciitis-ridden season, averaging a career-low 18.6 points and just not playing like the two-time MVP Tim Duncan we had all gotten used to.
Due to a glitch in the NBA’s seeding rules, the Mavs would play the Spurs in the second round. So, like a championship team would do, they took care of business in the opening round. Dallas swept the Memphis Grizzlies in outstanding fashion, winning by an average of 14 points per game. Dirk continued his MVP-level play and averaged 31 points on 51 percent shooting, along with 8 boards and 3 dimes per game. The talking heads on ESPN and TNT seemed to finally realize that the Mavericks were on a mission. Everyone in and around the league began to open their mouths and proclaim that not only are the Mavericks a damn good team, but they have a damn good chance of winning the NBA Finals.
So, the Mavericks sat and watched. And waited. For a week. San Antonio was having a tough time with the eighth-seeded Sacramento Kings. Previously a pretty good player, Kings guard Bonzi Wells was making fools of the Spurs’ All-Star backcourt, and the best defensive team in the league was allowing 97 points per game, 9 above their regular season average. Some even believed that the Kings would dethrone the Spurs in this first round when the series was tied 2-2. Essentially, if you thought the Spurs were vulnerable before the playoffs started, they were dead meat at this point. Naturally, those of us that were jumping the gun, including myself, were quickly corrected. The Spurs won the next two games, and the stage was set for the biggest series in recent Mavericks history.
Game 1: Spurs win, 87-85. Apparently that plantar fasciitis quit bothering Tim Duncan, because he scored 31 points and pulled down 13 rebounds. Jason Terry, on the other hand, only scored 14 on 33 percent shooting and Dirk finished with 20 points and 14 rebounds.
Game 2: Mavs win, 113-91. The Coach of the Year showed his genius by starting backup point guard Devin Harris over Adrian Griffin. The second-year man responded with 20 points on 7 of 12 shooting. Although Duncan continued his standout performance from game 1 with 28 points and 9 rebounds, the Mavericks still blew out the Spurs.
Game 3: Mavs win, 104-103. Harris continued his brilliance with 24 points, and Nowitzki poured in 27, along with 15 rebounds. Still, Tim Duncan does not stop. He finished with 35 points on 15-23 shooting with 12 rebounds.
Game 4: Mavs win, 123-118 in overtime. San Antonio coach Greg Popovich, who had taken Manu Ginobili, the star of last year’s championship run, out of the starting lineup for game 3, was forced to make another move and removed forward Robert Horry as well, and played the game with a four-guard lineup reminiscent of the Nellie days. They played a well-rounded game, with 32 points from Terry, 28 from Nowitzki, 26 from Stackhouse, and 18 from Harris. Duncan the beast remained dominant, with 31 and 11 rebounds while Tony Parker scored 33 and Ginobili scored 26 in 26 minutes off the bench.
At this point, the Mavericks had all the momentum. It was their turn to win, at least for this round, and it was time for them to deliver the knockout punch. Nearly everyone was jumping on the Dallas bandwagon at this point, however; everyone knew you could not count out the defending champions until they were, well, out. And then there was Game 5.
Watching the game, it looked eerily similar to the previous two. It was close throughout, and neither team was able to get an edge. However, the game had a different ending as the Spurs edged the Mavs, 98-97. Tim Duncan somehow played better than he did the first four games, hitting his first 12 shots and scoring 28 in the first half. Duncan had 36 points and 12 rebounds at the end of the game. Fortunately for the Mavericks, our superstar showed up too. The Bavarian Blitzkrieg finished with 31 points and 10 rebounds. The difference was the rest of the team. While Tony Parker and Manu Ginobili scored 27 and 18 respectively, Josh Howard was the Mavs’ second-leading scorer with 16 points. Harris and Terry each scored 15, but they both shot poorly.
Still, with the Mavs returning to a rowdy, proud, and loud American Airlines Center Friday night and leading the series 3-2, it looked like they still possessed all the momentum. Game 6 seemed to be the perfect opportunity for Dallas to serve San Antonio the knockout punch.
But Thursday afternoon, the NBA announced that Jason Terry would be suspended for the game for punching Michael Finley near the end of game 5. Mark Cuban went on the radio Thursday night and made some statements, most notably “There's not going to be one fan that doesn't believe that we can kick their butt all the way back to that ugly ass, muddy water they call a Riverwalk.” The city was angry about the suspension, and the Mavs were in the position to play the victim and come out to play the biggest game of their lives without one of their best players.
Too bad that didn’t happen. To sum it up, Spurs won. By five points. Game 7 is in San Antonio. How quickly the tides can change. The home team has won Game 7 83 percent of the time in the history of the league. The Spurs are the champions. “This is the Mavericks' worst nightmare,” one Dallas area columnist wrote. Is it? I mean, these teams are so ridiculously evenly matched it’s not even funny. Every single game has been decided by five or fewer points except for one.
That one game that was not close was decided by 22 points. And the Mavs won, which leads me to believe that this series needs to have a closer look.
Look at the games we lost, games 1 and 5 in San Antonio and game 6 in Dallas. In Game 1, Terry only scored 14 points. Harris, who has transformed into an extremely important piece for the Mavericks, scored 3 points in 15 minutes. Dirk shot 40 percent, 11 percentage points below his playoff average. And we still had a chance to win! If it wasn’t for Jerry Stackhouse making a bad decision with time running out, he could have easily made a two and sent the game to overtime. Who knows what could have happened? What did happen is the Mavs played awfully and were right there at the end of the game.
Game 5 was basically the same story. Terry, Stackhouse, and Terry all shot under fifty percent. Ginobili, Parker, and Duncan all had amazing games. Diop and Dampier, like every other game, played limited minutes because of foul trouble and the Mavericks were forced to go small, which meant no one to attempt to guard Duncan. And guess what? Terry’s shot goes in or Dirk’s tip goes in as time is winding down and we’re talking about a 5 game elimination of the defending champions. All we can ask for is a chance to win a game.
In game 6, I expected Harris to play extremely well in the absence of Terry. I expected Howard and Stackhouse to pick up his scoring load. I expected Avery to rally his troops and I expected those troops to play the game with more effort than the Spurs showed in the previous game.
None of that happened. The MVP (Steve Nash is not the MVP) played a monstrous game. He scored 26 points on 9 of 16 shooting, grabbed a career high 21 rebounds, and dished out 5 assists while hitting all eight of his free throws. His team was still in San Antonio. Jason Terry wasn’t playing. With DA being 84 years old and Devin Harris shooting 3-14 for 7 points and only 3 assists, the Mavs were playing without a pointguard for the most part. Josh Howard, who hadn’t been heard from the way we’ve gotten used to hearing from scored 17 points, but it took him 17 shots to do it. Dampier and Diop were in constant foul trouble again. Stackhouse had a horrible game- 10 points on 4-15 shooting. Remember Marquis Daniels? He didn’t pick up Terry’s slack either, only scoring 8 points. With the extra opportunity for playing time with Harris in foul trouble, Daniels only managed to stay on the floor for 18 minutes.
The Mavs did do some good things, like hold Tony Longoria to 8 points and forcing Duncan to shoot 21 times to get his 24. However, the Mavs played a horrible game overall. And if you don’t get the recurring theme yet, they still had a chance to win! The ball just did not bounce Dallas’ way in the last few minutes and the Spurs only won by five points.
What I’m trying to say is, Dallas has not shown up. And Game 7 is the perfect time for them to show up, especially because there won’t be another chance. With everyone healthy, this team has the potential to rise up and play like they did during their 14-game winning streak in February. They’ve shown they can do it, so don’t give up on them now.
This is the Mavs’ year.
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