[BGMaverick9]

Defense, defense, defense. Neither team really perfromed that well in that department and whoever made the adjustment first had a pretty great shot at taking the win tonight. The problem is, neither team really made the adjustment but there was another factor that led to trouble for Dallas tonight.

The substitution routine with Dirk went down again. Again, it was a 50/50 proposition, it didn't hurt them in the first but it did later in the 2nd quarter. I think RC was content to let Dirk set the remainder of the half but the avalanche kept coming and he was probably forced to bring him back in. I kind of like the strategy for the first part of the half but it needs to be tweaked. Go with what they do and give him a break in the middle of the first if they can and another small one in the middle of the second. He needs to be there in the beginning and the end of quarters.

It was surprising to see an instance where the Dallas 4/5s were much more aggressive and active in the paint vs an opposing team. That was the case early and Dallas got to the line a ton in the first half because of it. In the offseason they're going to have to make a decision on Bass vs Singleton. Singleton really didn't do anything in defending from the SF position, again. Both seem primed to play the 4 or in extreme cases the 5. I'm not really sure that there is a major need to have BOTH going forward, long term.

In the first half the Mavs bench helped fill the void with Josh tonight, but based on how he had been playing, it definitely would've been nice to have Josh. Bass, JJ and Jet all did some nice things in the scoring department. That went away in the 2nd half but that's because the balancing act went away and Dirk was running hot.

Wright's offense can be pretty touch and go but his defense can usually be counted on. He forced guys off of shots and made things difficult and he hustled. I can live with the offense as long as he brings the defense. This summer, work on the corner 3. There are numerous times where that is available and wide open in this offense. They need a person that can make opposing teams pay, it's always a blind spot that is left free.

Dirk was a little quiet early but there was quite a balance going on where everyone was involved in scoring. Again, scoring really wasn't the issue tonight, it was the defense. He really took control in the 3rd, when they needed it. It's kind of a stat-geek stat but his 19 game streak of 20 or more goes to show, he's going to find a way to get his numbers. And we needed every single one of those performances. He ran out of gas at the end, but if we didn't have him in the 3rd, this could've been pretty ugly.

On the other side with scoring...Jet just hasn't looked the same for the past couple of weeks. Around the Atlanta/Indy games, I really started to notice there was a drop-off. Some of his misses tonight were bricks.

Offensive rebounds killed Dallas tonight, they gave up way too many of them and gave Memphis enough second chance points to make the difference tonight. If they took those looks away, this could've gone the Mavs way. This isn't an easy loss to swallow.