Views from the other side: Game Three

[duncan228]

Mavericks had better find some defense (http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/spt/basketball/mavs/stories/042410dnspotaylor.455056f.html)
by Jean-Jacques Taylor / The Dallas Morning News

For one five-minute stretch in the third quarter, the Mavericks actually played playoff-worthy defense.

But when it mattered most, the Mavs' defense disappeared. We probably shouldn't be surprised.

These Mavs, just like every one of their predecessors, have never been good enough to win anything that mattered without playing defense.

Nothing changed Friday night at the AT&T Center as San Antonio beat Dallas, 94-90, to take a 2-1 lead in this Western Conference quarterfinal.

Now the Mavs have a big problem. They'd better win Sunday or this series is over.

Don't kid yourselves; the Mavs ain't beating the Spurs three consecutive times.

Maybe, just maybe, we'll get some of the defensive urgency and intensity Dallas displayed in the third quarter throughout the entire game.

Otherwise, there's a good chance the Mavs as we know them get blown up in the off-season, as they should if they can't figure out a way to get out of the first round.

You can't win 55 games, earn the coveted second seed in the West and lose in the first round, no matter how much respect we have for the seventh-seeded Spurs.

The Mavs have talked about playing better defense since training camp, and they did it early in the season. Actually, they emphasized defense so much, their offense suffered.

Imagine that.

But as the season has progressed, their offense improved and their defensive mind-set slowly evolved into the same, old defensive indifference we've become accustomed to seeing over the years.

The Mavs, as currently constructed, are only going to play so much defense.

They played hard defensively in Game 1, a lifetime ago, and played poorly defensively in Game 2. The Spurs shot better than 50 percent in each game, and they shot 48.7 percent in Game 3.

The Mavs' inconsistent defense also leads to stagnant offense.

This team is at its best when it's running. It's pretty hard to run the break when you're taking the ball out of the basket all of the time.

The Mavs totaled just 14 fast-break points.

Four times, they committed shot-clock violations. You almost never see that, but that's what happens when the offense has no flow.

"Teams become familiar with one another as the series progresses," said Carlisle, "and it becomes more difficult as the series goes on to score in the half-court. You have to fight for everything."

The Mavs finally played defense the way they're capable – with passion, urgency and a little trickery in the second half.

Coach Rick Carlisle used a 2-3 zone in the third quarter, and it befuddled the Spurs. They stopped attacking the basket, which they had done with regularity in the first half, and settled for jumpers when they weren't turning the ball over.

The Mavs chart three-possession stops because it's an indication of sustained defensive intensity.

During their 17-0 run, the Mavs stopped the Spurs on eight of 10 possessions and took a 68-59 lead. They did it by contesting shots and deflecting passes. They did it because they played with a desperation that's too often lacking.

Midway through the fourth quarter, the Mavs put together another good defensive stretch, stopping the Spurs on six of seven possessions, turning a 78-73 deficit into an 81-80 lead.

But with the game – perhaps the series – in doubt during the final three minutes of the fourth quarter, the Mavs' defense didn't do a thing.

Tony Parker hit a jumper just inside the 3-point line for an 82-81 lead with 2:28 left. After the Spurs forced a traveling call against J.J. Barea, Parker hit another jumper from the left baseline as the Spurs took an 84-81 lead.

Parker drilled another jumper from the left baseline for an 86-81 lead with 51.6 seconds left.

Ballgame.

[m33p0]

ballgame indeed.

[LoneStarState'sPride]

Um, have I mentioned I love me some TP? Cuz I do!

[JWest596]

They'd better win Sunday or this series is over.

Don't kid yourselves; the Mavs ain't beating the Spurs three consecutive times.

Sundays game is the dagger, We have to protect the homecourt. Win, take the last game at home and get some rest.

[duhoh]

game.

shirts.

[duncan228]

Going small was big weapon for Mavericks, just not big enough (http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/spt/basketball/mavs/stories/042410dnspotownsend.462eb9d.html)
by Brad Townsend / The Dallas Morning News

After another atrocious first quarter and four more shaky minutes in the second, Rick Carlisle had seen enough Friday night.

He watched his team score 16 first-quarter points and commit six turnovers. He saw Caron Butler make ill-advised decisions for the second straight game. Carlisle even gave rookie Roddy Beaubois his first playoff minutes.

With 7:53 left in the first half and the Mavericks trailing, 32-26, Carlisle inserted little J.J. Barea. Carlisle went small.

Small ball ultimately wasn't successful enough, as San Antonio won, 94-90, to take a 2-1 series lead. But Barea-led small ball got the Mavericks back in the game. Small ball and a great personal run by Dirk Nowitzki spurred a 17-0 Mavericks third-quarter run.

Small ball is not the way to beat the rugged San Antonio Spurs and it certainly isn't the blueprint to an NBA title. But used in correct doses, the Mavericks showed during a tense, physical Game 3 at the AT&T Center that small ball could be an effective weapon in this series.

"J.J. got penetration, and we needed it," Carlisle said of Barea, who finished with 14 points, four assists and four rebounds in 31 minutes.

"He made good things happen on offense. Defensively, he was active. It helped when he was out there. It was positive."

That was as close to a ringing endorsement as you were going to get from grim-faced Carlisle after his team came tantalizingly close to stealing back homecourt advantage and the series' momentum.

On a strange night when the Mavericks made eight 3-pointers to the Spurs' zero – that's not a misprint – the Mavericks almost certainly would have won had Manu Ginobili not returned from a bloodied, broken nose in the fourth quarter.

"It's a very physical series," Carlisle said. "There's a lot of contact going on. One of the realities of playoff basketball is the best way to get some good looks is in transition."

That's the main reason Carlisle went small, but not the only one. After his Feb. 13 acquisition from Washington, Butler was hailed for adding physicality to the Mavericks' starting lineup as a rugged 6-7 shooting guard.

But for most of the 14 minutes he played Friday, Butler looked lost. He scored two points on 1-of-3 shooting and committed three turnovers.

That followed the Game 2 loss in Dallas in which Butler scored 17 points but committed three turnovers and hoisted 17 shots, many of them off-balance and out of rhythm.

"I want him to be aggressive," Carlisle said. "We've looked at some film on shot selection, things like that. We want to be aggressive, but we want to be in strong position where we're making a good play."

With Butler again struggling, Carlisle went with a three-guard lineup for most of the final three quarter, with Jason Kidd, Jason Terry and Barea carrying most of the load. Spurs coach Gregg Popovich matched with his own three-guard sets.

"They played a lot of minutes this year with a small lineup," Popovich said. "We thought it would appear at some point and that we would have to match up with them. I thought we did a pretty good job of it."

[duncan228]

Duncan causing problems for Mavericks (http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/spt/basketball/mavs/stories/042410dnspomavsmatch.4631f67.html)
Brandon George/Dallas Morning News

The Mavericks continued to have no answer for Tim Duncan. Dallas primarily defended him with one player in Game 3 on Friday. That one man was usually either starting center Erick Dampier or backup Brendan Haywood. Neither could slow Duncan.

Even when Dampier pushed him in his back late in the third quarter, Duncan made the layup. Duncan had 16 points on 7-for-11 shooting by halftime and finished with 25 points.

The one advantage of having two centers capable of starting is that it gives the Mavericks twice as many fouls to use against Duncan. But that didn't work either.

Game 3: Tim Duncan

25 points, 44 minutes, 5 rebounds

Game 3: Erick Dampier and Brendan Hayward combined

4 points, 45 minutes, 8 rebounds

[duncan228]

Dirk can't do it all by himself (http://sports.espn.go.com/dallas/nba/columns/story?columnist=caplan_jeff&id=5131977)
The Mavericks need to find support for their lone star or their season will collapse
By Jeff Caplan
ESPNDallas.com

Shaq and Dwight Howard can quibble over being called Superman, but right now Superman suits up for the Dallas Mavericks. That's right, Dirk Nowitzki is Superman and not by choice, but by sheer necessity.

We all know Superman flies solo, no masked sidekick to pack a wallop and, heck, not even a masked canine to stand by his side. But, let's leave the dog references to San Antonio Spurs coach Gregg Popovich.

Mavericks coach Rick Carlisle has his own issues now with a team that talked afterward of sticking together, yet the Western Conference's No. 2 seed has the appearance of a club fraying under the pressure as yet another promising postseason begins to slip away.

With Jason Kidd slumping, Caron Butler benched for the entire second half and Shawn Marion the majority of it, the battling-but-scoring-deficient Mavericks fell in Friday's Game 3, 94-90, to trail the San Antonio Spurs, 2-1, in the best-of-7, first-round series.

It seemed Nowitzki, who took a pummeling in piling up a game-high 35 points that more than doubled the production of his four starting teammates, would have had a better chance of bending steel than having put the Mavs in position to win in the final minutes.

Yet, there they were -- spurred by a 17-0 run in the third quarter and a three-guard lineup that saw spunky, strong-willed J.J. Barea play the entire second half and score 14 massive points -- taking an 81-80 lead with 3:13 to play. But, it was the steady Spurs backcourt of Tony Parker, Manu Ginobili and George Hill that made the crunch-time plays, scoring San Antonio's final 14 points and 26 of 28 in the fourth quarter to seal the victory.

Butler, who never removed his sweats after halftime and then left the postgame locker room without uttering a word, Marion, who played just five minutes in the second half, and Kidd combined to make five of their 18 shots.

"It was a coach's decision," Carlisle said of the benching. "I was going with a group that was going good. We needed penetration and that was it."

Kidd finished with seven points, five assists and seven rebounds in 45 minutes. He's 2-of-13 from the field in the last two games, both losses, after putting up 13 points and 11 assists in the Game 1 win. Jason Terry tried to lift the scoring burden off Nowitzki with 17 points, but he went stone cold again in the fourth quarter, missing 6-of-8 shots.

"We're not shooting the ball extremely well, but we gave ourselves a chance to win on the road and that's all you can ask for," Kidd said. "That's the game of basketball."

The question now is what state will the Mavs be in when they return to practice in preparation for pivotal Game 4 that will either even the series going back to Dallas or put the Mavs in a serious hole. While the main theme emanating from the locker room was of sticking together, Marion also voiced confusion and frustration at his deteriorating playing time.

He logged 21 minutes in Game 2 and was frustrated in Game 3 with his second-half benching after limiting Manu Ginobili to two points in the first half. Ginobili, even after getting pounded on the bridge of the nose, erupted for 15 second-half points.

"How can I be effective being pulled in and out like a rag doll," Marion said. "I'm going to go out and play hard when I step on the floor and that's all I can control. Go ask coach, you can't ask us. When I lace my shoes up I'm ready to go. I was told to stay on Ginobili. He didn't score that first half, you know what I'm saying? I had him on clamps. I was on him, but I can't control that.

"I'm going to do what I got to do. I want to play, definitely, I don't want to sit on the damn bench, but what can I do? I'm not making the substitutions. We're still confident. We've got to help each other the best way we can."

Brendan Haywood, who joined the Mavs with Butler in the All-Star break trade, said his longtime teammate in Washington and the rest of his new teammates are still together and still focused on making this a long series.

"Why wouldn't they be? It's the playoffs," Haywood said. "Everybody wants to play; everybody can't play. Right about now it's not about yourself, it's about the team, so I don't have any doubt in my mind everybody's ready to play, whether you play one minute or you play 41 minutes."

Nowitzki might have some doubts. The Mavs got off to another slow start and spent the entire game fighting from behind.

Throughout the regular season, he was asked if it's too much for him to have to carry the scoring load night-in and night-out. The trade was supposed to help.

Kidd's increased scoring in the second half of the season was supposed to help. But here they are, dependent once again on Superman.

"We need to have four or five guys playing at a really high level, offensively," Carlisle said. "Our whole game has to be such that we strike the right balance that Dirk and Jet don't have to carry too big a load and we can spread the responsibility out."

It better start on Sunday.

[JustinJDW]

These are very interesting reads. It's very weird reading about these situations from the other side. They talk about us the same way we talk about them.

[50 cent]

http://www.star-telegram.com/2010/04/24/2139299/spurs-hang-tough-to-overcome-the.html#ixzz0m0N7LumA (Spurs hang tough to overcome the Mavericks in physical Game 3)

By RANDY GALLOWAY

[email protected]

galloway SAN ANTONIO — You can say it got better for the Dallas Mavericks. You can also be sure it got worse.

So it went here Friday night, as the Mavericks ended up in a playoff series hole that hasn’t reached critical yet, but is digging in that direction.

The unthinkable, particularly for Mark Cuban, would be a first-round ouster in a situation where the Mavs are favored, rather heavily in fact.

But Spurs by 94-90 was a Game 3 case of San Antonio having more crunch-time players, and also more players who responded when things suddenly got physical.

Two days ago, and an about an hour north by air, the Mavericks had flunked the most basic element of playoff basketball:

A ho-hum display of energy at the opening tip and beyond.

Or was it even a bigger felony, meaning starting a game with an effort that was flat-out below acceptable? But whatever the root cause of the Game 2 disgrace in downtown Dallas 48 hours earlier, Friday night was the opportunity for Mavs’ redemption.

Just play hard, OK?

Consider it done.

Next worry. Full-blown effort led by the smurf-power of J.J. Barea, plus star-power from Dirk still wasn’t enough.

The Mavs ran out of fourth quarter offensive juice, in one stretch going over six minutes without a field goal, mainly because Mr. Nowitzki finally saw the defensive double teams that never came in the first two games.

Coach Pop of the Spurs, of course, had no choice. Dirk was killing him through three quarters with 29 points. He ended up with 35.

Combine that with the boost from Barea off the bench (14 points and four assists) and the Mavs seemingly took control in the third quarter, running off a 9-point lead at one point.

But here’s the kicker:

The Big Three of the Spurs delivered (Tim Duncan, 25 points; Tony Parker, 23 points; Manu Ginobili, after a slow start, then a busted nose, 15 points, including 11 in the fourth quarter.)

In addition, rookie George Hill made a huge difference with 17 points and a good overall game.

On the flip side:

The Mavs’ starting backcourt of Caron Butler and Jason Kidd, combined for nine points, with Butler being benched in the second quarter, not to return. Outside of Dirk, the rest of the starting lineup had 16 points combined.

Jason Terry was a boost off the bench, but suddenly went cold late.

The scary part after three games, and with the Spurs holding a 2-1 series lead, is there has also been a role reversal.

It doesn’t appear the Mavericks have enough. Players, that is. It does appear the Spurs have help for the Big Three, which was not the case when the series opened. In the Game 2 win, it was Richard Jefferson. In this win it was Hill, who played an excellent overall game by contributing on the defensive end.

Meanwhile, Rick Carlisle must have had to restrain himself from adding another player beyond Butler to the “benched” category.

Jason Kidd was awful, repeatedly hesitating on the offensive end, and causing several shot clock violations along with a 3-second violation turnover. Kidd was 1-for-6 shooting and his quarterbacking the offense was of the JV variety.

For public consumption, Carlisle didn’t agree that Kidd was a huge liability when asked a question about the 45 minutes logged. “I would love to get him more rest. It was my decision to have him out there. We always play better when he’s on the floor,” he said.

It appeared in this game the Mavs attempted to survive because Kidd was on the floor.

Speaking of minutes, of the limited variety, Carlisle used two starters in small doses. Shawn Marion had his time whacked for the second straight game, this time getting 16 minutes, while Butler was under 15 minutes.

Carlisle went early to a three-guard offense, bringing Barea and Terry off the bench. Barea sparked the offense, not only with his driving but also with his QB-ing. It would have been interesting to see more of rookie Roddy B (he played five minutes in his series debut) as a replacement for Kidd, teaming that backcourt speed with Barea and Terry.

Even Gregg Popovich made a point of praising J.J. “He’s a tough dude. He plays hard. Plays physical,” Pop said. “He was really good tonight.”

Nowitzki was also great on this night, snapping back after a miserable and timid Game 2. Instead, however, of German jello, this time he was NBA toughness, inviting contact by repeatedly putting the ball on the floor and lumbering toward the bucket. He took a beating, but it was a huge and gutty effort, deserving, it seemed, of more than only eight free-throw attempts.

Gutty also describes Ginobili, who had his nose rearranged by a Dirk elbow which came after a Manu foul on Dirk. Ginobili left the game in the third quarter, then left the floor for more treatment, but returned with a revenge motive, scoring seven of the first nine points for the Spurs to open the fourth quarter.

The one consolation for the Mavs is they needed one win here this weekend, and still have that opportunity.

Now, however, the one win is a total necessity for Sunday’s Game 4. Losing is not an option if survival in this series is going to happen.
[/quote]

[hsxvvd]

Going small was big weapon for Mavericks, just not big enough (http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/spt/basketball/mavs/stories/042410dnspotownsend.462eb9d.html)
by Brad Townsend / The Dallas Morning News

After another atrocious first quarter and four more shaky minutes in the second, Rick Carlisle had seen enough Friday night.

He watched his team score 16 first-quarter points and commit six turnovers. He saw Caron Butler make ill-advised decisions for the second straight game. Carlisle even gave rookie Roddy Beaubois his first playoff minutes.

With 7:53 left in the first half and the Mavericks trailing, 32-26, Carlisle inserted little J.J. Barea. Carlisle went small.

Small ball ultimately wasn't successful enough, as San Antonio won, 94-90, to take a 2-1 series lead. But Barea-led small ball got the Mavericks back in the game. Small ball and a great personal run by Dirk Nowitzki spurred a 17-0 Mavericks third-quarter run.

Small ball is not the way to beat the rugged San Antonio Spurs and it certainly isn't the blueprint to an NBA title. But used in correct doses, the Mavericks showed during a tense, physical Game 3 at the AT&T Center that small ball could be an effective weapon in this series.

"J.J. got penetration, and we needed it," Carlisle said of Barea, who finished with 14 points, four assists and four rebounds in 31 minutes.

"He made good things happen on offense. Defensively, he was active. It helped when he was out there. It was positive."

That was as close to a ringing endorsement as you were going to get from grim-faced Carlisle after his team came tantalizingly close to stealing back homecourt advantage and the series' momentum.

On a strange night when the Mavericks made eight 3-pointers to the Spurs' zero – that's not a misprint – the Mavericks almost certainly would have won had Manu Ginobili not returned from a bloodied, broken nose in the fourth quarter.

"It's a very physical series," Carlisle said. "There's a lot of contact going on. One of the realities of playoff basketball is the best way to get some good looks is in transition."

That's the main reason Carlisle went small, but not the only one. After his Feb. 13 acquisition from Washington, Butler was hailed for adding physicality to the Mavericks' starting lineup as a rugged 6-7 shooting guard.

But for most of the 14 minutes he played Friday, Butler looked lost. He scored two points on 1-of-3 shooting and committed three turnovers.

That followed the Game 2 loss in Dallas in which Butler scored 17 points but committed three turnovers and hoisted 17 shots, many of them off-balance and out of rhythm.

"I want him to be aggressive," Carlisle said. "We've looked at some film on shot selection, things like that. We want to be aggressive, but we want to be in strong position where we're making a good play."

With Butler again struggling, Carlisle went with a three-guard lineup for most of the final three quarter, with Jason Kidd, Jason Terry and Barea carrying most of the load. Spurs coach Gregg Popovich matched with his own three-guard sets.

"They played a lot of minutes this year with a small lineup," Popovich said. "We thought it would appear at some point and that we would have to match up with them. I thought we did a pretty good job of it."

Please Carlisle, stick with your small ball.

It's like a reversal of the 06' series.