12/21/24
December 26, 2011
Heat Crush Mavericks in Season Opener: After the Dallas Mavericks raised their NBA championship banner, the Miami Heat crushed the Mavs 105-94 in the Christmas Day season opener for the teams, ending a 14-game regular season losing streak against the Mavs. The Heat led by 32 after the third period but reserves made the score respectable. LeBron James had 37 points, 10 rebounds and six assists. Dwyane Wade had 26 points, eight rebounds and six assists. "Celebration or not, we had a game plan and implemented it," Wade said. The new-look Mavs lost Tyson Chandler, Caron Butler and J.J. Barea in the offseason and added Lamar Odom, Vince Carter and Delonte West.
posted by rcade to basketball at 10:04 AM - 3 comments
Eh, it's been an ugly start, but I don't think it's any big secret that Cuban and Donnie Nelson are: A) hoping Carlisle can pull this motley crew together and make it semi-respectable [anything else would be gravy] while B) getting stuff in line to make a play for 2012's big free agent market.
Obviously that's a bit disheartening for Mavs fans (myself included) and there's certainly no guarantee that the gambit will work, but from what I can glean, this is where we are. If the alternative is a post-Dirk era built around Dominique Jones and Roddy Buckets and who-knows-what-else, then I guess I've gotta trust the management/ownership for now.
posted by Ufez Jones at 01:50 AM on December 27, 2011
If you had to pick two matchups that the Mavs would have trouble with it would probably be Miami and Denver. Teams that just want to run run run. I think we are just seeing the worst of the Mavs right now.
posted by tron7 at 10:59 AM on December 28, 2011
Tonight's loss to the Nuggets was even more lopsided. They have time to figure things out but this is not an encouraging start to the year.