Why the Mavs will beat the Spurs (kinda long?)

[gettym]

I've kicked this around quite a bit, and I'm not sure that the Spurs can make enough adjustments to beat the Mavs. Sure, they might win another game, but I don't see any way that they can win the series.

The Mavs dominated last night, and Dirk didn't even have to have a big game.

The Spurs have only one guy who has ANY chance of covering Howard -- Bruce Bowen. The problem for them is, he's busy bear-hugging Dirk. A switch defensively is out of the question, because that would unleash Dirk completely. It really is a "pick your poison" situation, because either Howard or Dirk is going to go off. Period.

The Spurs have nobody who can cover Devin Harris. Sure, they can change their pick and roll defense to help on Harris, but the guy setting the screen is a scorer (either Dirk or Howard, usually) who will get the ball right back and hit the shot. Admittedly, they'll probably try some of this to make Harris into a passer rather than a scorer just to see if he can make the right decisions, but I have full confidence in Harris. He looked calm, cool, and completely in control out there last night. He really ran the team and managed the game well.

A further problem for the Spurs is that while they're busy trying to guard Harris, Howard, and Dirk, they have to put a really weak defender on Terry/Stackhouse/Daniels. Bad news for them, because Stackhouse has taken advantage so far, and you have to think that Terry will have some good shooting games before the series is over.

On the other end, the matchups REALLY work well for Dallas. Our centers (despite constant foul trouble) are really holding their own against Duncan. Likewise, the perimeter defense against Ginobili and Parker has been very good, particularly now that Harris is in the lineup. Harris is the guy who can keep Parker from dominating. This allows the team to stay at home on the Spurs three point shooters. The Spurs hit 4 3-pointers the entire game, and had only 13 attempts. The Mavs are doing a fantastic job of shutting that part of the Spurs attack down. The thing is, when you don't allow Duncan and/or Spurs guard penetration to create open 3-pointers, you take away the offensive contributions of about half of the Spurs rotation (Bowen, Finley, Horry, Barry, Van Exel). The Spurs won't put their centers on the floor because of defensive matchup problems, which means that they're basically left trying to get all of their offensive production from Duncan, Ginobili, and Parker. And I don't think that's going to work for them.

[capone0]

I hate the Spurs, I hate the Mavs but the Spurs are resilent and will do whatever they need to do to win. As seen by Game 1, the Mavs sometimes don't have that in them.

Even if the Mavs make it out of this series, I can't see them beating the Pistons this year. They are just too good, too tested and too solid and right now don't have any serious injuries such as Duncans. Will see though, I'll root for the Mavs just to spite the Spurs this year.

[Isura]

Is it just me, or does Van Exel really look like a regular homeless crack addict? Talk about letting yourself go.

[tdarko]

Capone,

[ QUOTE ]
I hate the Spurs, I hate the Mavs

[/ QUOTE ]

Any reason why?

[capone0]

Kings fan. I hate Mavs more. The Spurs not so much, just sick of them dominating (I'd kill myself if I have to see another Detroit-Spurs final). Not a big fan of Manu (respect Parker and Duncan alot) and not a big fan of all of their former King killers (Horry, NVE and Finley).

I just don't like the Mavs from a couple years ago when it was Mavs-Kings every year. It was a pretty good rivalry back in the Dirk-Webber days that we for the most part dominated with Webber on the team. The Mavs have gotten very good though, and I guess I'm slightly jealous. At some point in last season the Kings were like 2 games ahead of the Mavs and since Avery became their coach they have been much better although we kinda evened up a bit with the Ron Ron trade.

Cliff Notes: Hate Spurs due to Manu and Kings killers. Mavs due to older rivalry.

[Fallen Hero]

"Our centers (despite constant foul trouble) are really holding their own against Duncan."

I don't think we watched the same games.

I also don't agree with the argument that the Mavs played well withouth needing a fantastic night by Dirk, the Mavs can't play the way they did (wich I think is the best way to beat the spurs) and at the same time have Dirk scoring 40 points.
On the other side of this argument, nobody in the Spurs had a good game (except for Duncan) and the game wasn't horribly one-sided.

[capone0]

Duncan blitzed them, the problem was he was in foul trouble. Duncan had 28/9 and 3 assists and 4 blocks in 35 minutes with 8-10 from the field and 12-14 from the line.

While Diop and Dampier had a combined 3 points, 10 boards, 2 steals and 1 block adn 1-3 from the field.

Duncan didn't play well early in the Kings series but he's playing very well now.

The reason the Spurs lost game 2 is Parker and Ginobili's relatively poor play, the Spurs as a whole losing the rebounding battle and the Spurs poor control of the ball (14 TOs to 6 TOs for Dallas) which led to 12 more shots from the field for Dallas and a blow out in the score board.

[ClassicBob]

One of the most important things we had going for us last night defensively was being able to double-team Duncan, and still not give up three point shots due to excellent defensive rotation.

Don't know if I posted it here or on another board, but I've said from the beginning that Harris is probably the X-factor in this series. Glad to see he proved me right last night.

The Spurs have not looked good all year in my eyes. Too often they look old, slow, and injured. But they kept on winning, so I'm not ready to write them off yet. I predicted Mavs in six, and I'll stick with that, but I don't think last night's game should be any indication that the Mavs will run the rest of the series. Poppovich is a very good coach, and he'll make adjustments to the Mavs, just as Avery did last night.

[tdarko]

Capone,

Yeah, you should hate the Mavs. I see why. Good season, bro...I was rootin' for ya in the first round!

Yeah, the Kings still bother me too. Those games were crazy, I don't think the Mavs contested a shot ever.

[ClassicBob]

tdarko,

The Kings (other than maybe Christie) didn't either.