DALLAS MAVERICKS
Advanced Stats:
PACE #20 93.1
OFF #8 107.6
DEF #7 102.3
Dallas did exactly what people expected from them in the regular
season: be one of the top seeds in the Western conference. They were one of the
most fundamentally sound teams in the league, even though Dirk Nowitzki got
injured and missed some games that resulted in six losses in a row. Without
this injury, Dallas would have most likely been the top seed in their
conference.
Offensively,
Dallas has been typically a pure jump shooting team and the result of that was
that they were the 2nd worst team in scoring in the paint with just
36.7 ppg! They were also the 2nd team with less FGA’s at the rim
with 25.6 FGA/game and they didn’t even pursue their own misses, as they were
the 5th worst team in offensive rebounding, with a rate of jump
24.1%. The good news is that Dallas hit their shots last season. They were the
best team in shooting “long two’s” (16-23 feet range) with 45.3% FG and they
were also 3rd in the league in eFG% shooting with 52.48%.
Defensively,
Tyson Chandler was a huge addition for Dallas, but the truth must be told:
Dallas was just marginally better defensively than they had been in the
previous season – 102.3 vs 103.2 in terms of defensive efficiency! Same goes
for points allowed in the paint – 41.7 ppg in 09-10 vs 41.6 ppg in 10-11. So,
how did a team who was eliminated in the first round of the playoffs in the
previous year become the NBA champion in the following season?
In my
opinion, it was a combination of being hot and clutch in the right moment and
most importantly to maximize their matchup advantages against their opponents.
Normally,
a team isn’t expected to keep the same offensive effectiveness in the playoffs
in comparison with the regular season. It’s normal for the teams to lose some
effectiveness, as not only they face stronger opposition as the series remove
some the surprise effect as the games go by. But that didn’t happen with
Dallas! According to my numbers, Dallas had an offensive efficiency of 114.5 vs
Portland, 117.7 vs Lakers, 115.9 vs Oklahoma City and 111.5 vs Miami in the
finals! Speaking now of being clutch, Dirk Nowitzki was the ultimate definition
of being a clutch player. During the playoffs, he attempted 186 FT’s and hit
94.1% of them, which is the highest percentage in NBA history among those who
have attempted at least 65 free throws in a single postseason!
Rick
Carlslie and his staff also did an amazing job by maximizing their matchup
advantages. Against the Blazers, Jason Kidd was pivotal by shooting 9-14 FG
(6-10 3PTS) & 7-11 FG (3-6 3PTS) in the first two games. Portland decided
to double team Dirk with their guards while choosing Kidd to be the Mavs player
left wide open. The Mavs punished that. Then, the Blazers decided to respect
Kidd’s long range shooting. With that,
Dirk got more space and caved the Blazers with 58pts in the final two games of
the series.
Against
the Lakers, the Mavs took advantage of the slow footed big men of the Lakers.
The team-help defense of the Lakers was ridiculously bad and the Mavs with
their great ball movement torched the Lakers from the 3PTS line. In the Game 4
of the series, the Lakers decided to give up the middle to attempt to stop the
hot shooters and so, the Mavs used Barea and his penetrations to torch them.
Barea played just 27 minutes, but shot 9-14 FG and dished 8 assists – team
high!
In the
conference final versus Oklahoma City, the Mavs had a huge matchup advantage in
using Dirk Nowitzki down low against Ibaka and Dirk really torched them.
Defensively, they were conservative in the first two games of the series, but
when they unleashed their awesome zone defense against the Thunder, Oklahoma
City simply couldn’t hit from the outside (as they usually struggle against
zone defenses). Note that in the last 3 games of the series (all Mavs wins),
the Thunder shot 1-17, 2-13 & 5-16 from the 3PTS line, in a combined effort
of 8-46 (17%)!
Finally
against Miami, Tyson Chandler was really a pivotal piece of the Mavs win, as he
is a terrific help defender and for several times he ended up guarding Wade or
Lebron in the final seconds of a possession. In almost any case around the
league, this would result in a huge mismatch in favor of the Heat, but with a
great leaping ability and footwork, Chandler made a terrific job in defending
Wade and Lebron. Props also for Kidd and Marion for their defensive assignments
against those two players. Offensively, Dallas struggled to hit their shots
from the outside and so, they relied on the free throw line and a clutch Dirk
to beat Miami. When they started to hit the 3PTS shots, Miami was done: 13-19
& 11-26 3PTS in the last two games of the series.
And so,
Dallas was able to be the 2010-2011 NBA champions!
Weirdly,
with the new CBA deal, the Mavs with Mark Cuban weren’t as aggressive as
expected to try to keep the same team from last season. They didn’t pursuit
Caron Butler, they knew Tyson Chandler wasn’t staying with them and even they JJ
Barea go to Minnesota! Instead, Mark Cuban used the Lakers sense of urgency to
save money to basically get Lamar Odom in exchange of nothing! Plus, they also
used the Suns buyout of Vince Carter to get him. With a tough schedule with
such short rests between the games and with the Mavs being such a veteran team,
they really need to have a deep roster and Mark Cuban is doing a really nice
job!
They have
now multiple guards: Kidd, Carter, Beaubois, West and Jones. I have some doubts
about the utility of signing Vince Carter. Last season, Carter was “pathetic”
in Phoenix maybe because of lack of motivation, but we are talking about
professional players, right?! He seems to not work hard when he doesn’t have
the ball on his hands, but the context of this situation might be good for him:
playing alongside Jason Kidd with the NBA champs and have a great big man to
perform the pick n rolls that he likes to do so much. But if he doesn’t’ show
up to play, then he’s done for good.
The issue
will be on the frontcourt. Haywood can be like Chandler when it comes to guard
1*1 the opposing center, as he is a good defensive center. The problem is that
Haywood doesn’t have the speed and lateral quickness to rotate defensively like
Chandler did for the Mavericks. Odom is a great player, but he isn’t a center,
so Rick Carlslie will have to make some magic in using the right lineup in the
right moments. Dirk can play with Odom at the same time as a center and Odom’s
good court vision will help the team.
We can
expect the Mavs to have a good ball movement once again. Are they the favorite
to win the NBA and the West this season? In my opinion, I don’t think so. They
will need similar circumstances from last season to win it all again. Dirk will
always be clutch, but the Mavs’ offensive efficiency from last season in the
playoffs will be very tough to repeat again. Nevertheless, we can expect the
usual Mavs for the regular season and be once again a top seed in the West.
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