Smallest Maverick Paves Way to Victory

Apr 19, 2009 | By: Tropics Staff

 

Smallest Maverick paves way to big Game 1 victory

By RANDY GALLOWAY (rgalloway@star-telegram.com)

SAN ANTONIO — Who needs Dirk? Who needs Jet? And Jason Kidd? He might as well have been pool furniture.

Trash that theory that said the Dallas Mavericks can’t win a playoff series anymore because they can’t win a playoff road game. Well, hello, win column here Saturday night.

The Mavs, with maybe a telltale-for-the-series fourth quarter, eased to a dominant 105-97 victory and ended the franchise road rot at nine consecutive L's stretched over the past three years.

It’s only Game 1, so don’t rush to any quick judgment, but these obviously aren’t the mighty San Antonio Spurs of old, and weren’t expected to be with injured Manu Ginobili watching in street clothes. But the NBA’s best playoff mastermind, coach Pop, will need to burn plenty of brain cells in coming up with a new plan for Monday night’s Game 2.

The Mavericks were the best this time, no disputing that, even with Mr. Nowitzki not playing a dominant role most of the evening. And with their energizer, Jason Terry, having a rather blah 35 minutes. No way, of course, you would think amazing could happen without those two being amazing.

But of all the other positive factors involved, start with the smallest one:

J.J. Barea.

Listed at 6-foot, but you know it’s a stretched lie, Barea got right in the grill of Mav-killer Tony Parker for most of the night, but especially the fourth quarter. In crunch time, little J.J. never left the floor, and in those 12 minutes held Parker (who wore down enough to take a 70-second break), to one meaningful field goal on 2-of-6 shooting.

Coach Rick Carlisle, as promised, threw a lot of bodies at Parker, who averaged 31 points an outing in four regular-season games against the Mavs. Antoine Wright took a turn, so did Terry and briefly even Kidd, who is mismatched against that kind of quickness.

But it was Barea, the unheralded, undrafted, third-year street find by Donnie Nelson, who had Parker grabbing the bottom of his shorts, meaning the lungs weren’t pumping adequate air.

Funny how this stuff works. Parker had 24 points, and it’s a bad night. But 9-of-22 partly explains why. On the other end of the floor, however, Barea wore Parker out defensively by constantly pushing the ball toward the paint and the hole.

Let’s pause right here, and also throw a little love the way of the much-cussed Erick Dampier, who worked his butt off for 38-plus minutes in "holding" Tim Duncan to 27 points. No, it’s true.

When Duncan doesn’t crack the three-0 mark, and neither does Parker, the Spurs can’t hang in this series. With no Manu, there’s simply not enough other points going to happen, even with Michael Finley scoring 19.

But the Mavs bench in Carlisle’s eight-man rotation outscored the Spurs bench 39-14 and that’s with a docile 12 points from Jason Terry.

Damp was a warrior. Those 38 minutes were his second-highest of the season.

Also say something real nice about Josh Howard, who personally took over the game late in the second quarter, then owned the game for most of the third quarter, and then watched the fourth quarter from the bench as Carlisle limited the Howard ankle to 29 minutes and got away with it.

But Josh’s 25 points easily led the Mavs’ scoring, and his head also seemed to be attached to his shoulders again, as opposed to being attached to other body parts. (See last April in the playoffs for an explanation to that comment).

One other name is very worthy of praise:

Brandon Bass came off the bench to get the offense rolling in the second quarter, and in only 18 overall minutes, made a physical impact.

But…

Let’s go hockey and get back to the No. 1 star of the Mavs first playoff road win since 1996 in Phoenix.

"He’s a helluva player…so quick," Barea said of a world-class talent like Parker. "I know he’s been killing us all year, but I felt like I knew all about him. The coaches have had me watching film on him for three days."

Barea was mobbed by postgame media for the first time in his NBA life. Parker, of course, also had to answer questions he’s definitely never heard in a great career. Like, how did that little guy do that to you?

"I thought he was flopping because he’s little, but those [calls] can go both ways and it didn’t go my way tonight," said Tony, obviously not full of Barea praise. "I’m going to have to adjust in Game 2."

"I got that charge call on him [in the fourth quarter], and I knew he didn’t like that," Barea said. "I did notice he was getting a little tired. But they were hugging Dirk and J.T., wanting to stop them, so I got some room to try to get to the basket [on Parker]."

Get there J.J. did against Parker, and he did it on both ends of the floor.

Stop Tony Parker and the Spurs can be stopped in this series.

Whatever happens next, Game 1 made Monday night that much more interesting, and also that much more vital for the Spurs.

Randy Galloway, 817-390-7760

 

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