Category: Dallas Mavericks Blog

Mavericks blog – Dallas Mavericks blog. A great Mavs news blog

Mavs hope to keep Devin Harris

Here’s ESPN Dallas reporting on the Mas, who are still fond of veteran guard Devin Harris and don’t mind having him around:

Mavs hope to keep Devin Harris

Mavericks sources remain confident that they’ll figure out a way to keep Devin Harris.

The team’s point guard Plan A is just likely to cost the Mavs a little more than they anticipated.

Golden State gave Shaun Livingston a three-year, $16 million deal, using the full midlevel exception. Sacramento will sign Darren Collison to an identical deal. Harris is certainly in their class, so it’s reasonable for him to expect to be paid in the $5 million-per-year range. That’s a nice bump from the deal worth a little more than $3 million per year that Harris originally agreed to with the Mavs last summer, only to settle for the veteran’s minimum after the discovery that he needed complicated toe surgery.

Mavericks happy to have Tyson Chandler back

Here’s the Fort Worth Star-Telegram reporting on the Dallas Mavericks:

Mavericks happy to have Tyson Chandler back

Chandler was the emotional leader and one of the guiding forces when the Mavs won their only NBA title three years ago. The 7-foot-1 center provided the defensive presence and rim protection the Mavs used to vault past the Miami Heat in the 2011 NBA Finals.

Following that championship season, however, Chandler left the Mavs via free agency and signed a four-year, $60 million contract with the New York Knicks.

But the Mavs and Chandler are back together again after they acquired the 13-year veteran and point guard Raymond Felton from the Knicks on Wednesday for Jose Calderon, Samuel Dalembert, Shane Larkin, Wayne Ellington and the 34th and 51st picks in Thursday’s NBA Draft.

Coach Rick Carlisle is more than elated to have Chandler back in his role as his team’s defensive vacuum cleaner.

Dirk Nowitzki unfazed by All-NBA omission

Here’s ESPN Dallas reporting on Mavs veteran Dirk Nowitzki, who is still an extremely good player but not rocking the league quite the way he used to:

For the second consecutive season, Dallas Mavericks forward Dirk Nowitzki was not named to the All-NBA team, but he took the result in stride.

“For me, I had a good bounce-back year, but I agree [with the announcement],” Nowitzki told ESPN Dallas. “Obviously, I’m not in the cream of the crop anymore. I think that’s no surprise. I’ll still try to be efficient going forward.”

Forwards Kevin Durant and LeBron James (first team), Blake Griffin and Kevin Love (second team) and Paul George and LaMarcus Aldridge (third team) were honored by the league on Wednesday.

The 2012-13 season marked the first time since the 1999-2000 season that Nowitzki was not named to an All-NBA Team. That was largely in part due to him missing the first 27 games of the season after undergoing arthroscopic surgery on his right knee. He did bounce back from that injury-plagued campaign by averaging 21.7 points per game this season.

Mavs beat Spurs 113-111, force Game 7

Monta Ellis is headed to his first Game 7, and DeJuan Blair gets a chance to play his old team in San Antonio one more time after all.

Dallas star Dirk Nowitzki will return to the site of one of the best moments of his stellar career.

Ellis scored 12 of his 29 points to lead a fourth-quarter comeback that also got an energetic boost from Blair in his return after getting suspended, and the Mavericks forced a deciding game in their first-round series with top-seeded San Antonio, beating the Spurs 113-111 on Friday night.

“Put all of our chips on the table and see what happens,” said Ellis, whose 3-pointer put eighth-seeded Dallas ahead for a good at 94-92 with 5 minutes to go.

Tony Parker matched Nowitzki with 22 points to lead the heavily favored Spurs, who are stuck in a tossup series after they won all four games against the Mavericks during the regular season and had a 10-game winning streak against them after taking the opener.

— Associated Press

Spurs beat Mavs for 3-2 series lead

Tony Parker was nursing a sprained left ankle and playing a critical playoff game on no sleep only hours after the birth of his first child.

It was the perfect formula for a resurgent performance from the San Antonio Spurs point guard.

Parker had 23 points and five assists and San Antonio never trailed in a 109-103 victory over the Dallas Mavericks on Wednesday night, taking a 3-2 lead in the first-round series.

“Coming into the game I told him this is perfect for you,” Spurs forward Tim Duncan said. “This is what he does in situations like this where he doesn’t get a lot of sleep or is in a stressful situation. He always seems to play better. I somewhat expected it from him.

“He was really excited before the game. Obviously, he was really excited to have his son here and wanted to get this game really badly not only for his son but for the situation and the timing of it. He was really focused and it was good for us.”

Parker’s rebirth put San Antonio on the verge of closing out a tense series against its intrastate rival with Game 6 set for Friday in Dallas.

Vince Carter scored 28 points on 10-for-16 shooting for the Mavericks.

— Associated Press

Spurs Big 3 does big damage to Mavs

Here’s the Fort Worth Star-Telegram blog repoting on the Spurs and Mavericks, who are facing each other in the first round of the NBA playoffs:

Spurs Big 3 does big damage to Mavs

On a night when the Dallas Mavericks’ offense went silent after the first 41 minutes, the San Antonio Spurs’ Big 3 came up big Sunday afternoon.

Tim Duncan, Tony Parker and Manu Ginobili combined to score 65 of the Spurs’ 90 points, grab 17 of their 48 rebounds, and dispensed nine of their 14 assists as San Antonio opened the playoffs with a 90-85 triumph over the Dallas Mavericks at AT&T Center.

“I wish I could always score like this, or Tony, or Tim,’’ said Ginobili, who scored 17 points and collected six rebounds. “The way they play defense didn’t let us move the ball as much as we usually do to find open teammates, so we played way more one-on-one.”

Mavericks clinch NBA playoff spot with win over Suns

Here’s the Fort Worth Star-Telegram reporting on the Dallas Mavericks, who are back in the playoffs. There is now just one playoff berth left, in the Western conference, and it will go to the Grizzlies or Suns. Anyway:

Champagne might as well have been flowing in the Dallas Mavericks’ locker room after what they were able to accomplish Saturday night.

Down 13 points in the third quarter and in a tense fight for their playoff lives, the Mavs clinched their 13th postseason berth in the past 14 years with a pulsating 101-98 victory over the Phoenix Suns at American Airlines Center.

The Mavericks (49-32) will seek to win 50 games for the first time since the 2010-11 season when they end the regular season Wednesday night in Memphis.

Using every ounce of energy they had, the Mavericks had to rally from a 13-point second-half deficit to beat the Suns, who dropped to 47-33.

Monta Ellis tied his season high with 37 points and Dirk Nowitzki scored 21 of his 23 points in the second half as the Mavericks kept barking at each other on the court during tense moments, and it paid off in the end.

Dirk Nowitzki passes Dominique Wilkins on NBA all-time scoring list

Here’s ESPN Dallas reporting on Dallas Mavericks star Dirk Nowitzki, who is a scorer of historical proportions:

Dirk Nowitzki has climbed higher than “The Human Highlight Film.”

The Dallas Mavericks star passed Dominique Wilkins for 11th place on the all-time scoring list Friday night when Nowitzki hit a free throw with 8:47 remaining in the third quarter against the Los Angeles Lakers.

“Unbelievable,” said Nowitzki , who finished with 27 points on 11-of-14 shooting in the Mavs’ 107-95 win, giving him 26,678 points for his career. “It’s been a crazy ride. I used to be a big fan of Dominique. I watched all his dunk contests and the many ways he could score, sometimes missing his own shot and he’d be the person to dunk over two people. He was just so much fun to watch.

“It’s been surreal. It’s been a crazy ride for 16 years, and I’m going to keep competing for a couple more years.”

Mavericks enjoy big win vs Clippers

Here’s the Dallas Morning News blog reporting on the Mavericks, who on Thursday beat the Clippers in Los Angeles, 113-107.

It’s a huge win: Just keep repeating that to yourself. Don’t worry about the fact that the Mavericks lost all but two points of a 109-97 lead in 85 seconds, which is really hard to do for an NBA team that still is trying hard. “The win was nice,” said Dirk Nowitzki. “Not so much the last couple minutes. We started to give the ball away again. And (J.J.) Redick had a (3-point) shot for the lead, which was amazing after having a 10-point lead.” Nevertheless, the Mavericks held on and that’s all that really matters.

Hope springs eternal: This win, and the win against Oklahoma City at home last week, is the sort of showing that makes you believe that the Mavericks have a puncher’s chance when the playoffs roll around. And it looks more and more now like the Mavericks will be a part of the postseason party this season. They aren’t in, by any stretch. But they have the three worst teams in the Western Conference (by record) coming up to finish this trip. They could be knocking on the door of clinching a playoff spot by the time they return home Wednesday.