DALLAS – The Cavaliers’ lone visit to Dallas this year. The Mavericks split their first two games, but Dirk Nowitzki and Josh Howard have come out strong to start the season. Nowitzki will get his, as will Howard, but look for the Cavs to come out strong in this one.
Dallas is still getting used to new coach Rick Carlisle, who Cleveland’s coach, Mike Brown, worked under after years with Avery Johnson. Mavs point guard Jason Kidd is starting to find his way in the offense and averages close to 10 assists per game in the very young season.
To be fair, most of the news coming out of the Cavs these days relates more to how the Detroit Pistons trade of Chauncey Billups and Antonio McDyess to the Denver Nuggets for Allen Iverson would affect the team.
Game: Cavaliers (2-2) vs. Dallas Mavericks (1-2)
Broadcast:
TV: FSOhio
Radio: WAKR (1590 AM); WTAM (1100 AM), WHBC (1480 AM)
Starters: Cavs: LeBron James (F); Ben Wallace (F); Zydrunas Ilgauskas (C); Mo Williams (G); Delonte West (G). Mavericks: Josh Howard (F); Dirk Nowitzki (F); Eric Dampier (C); Jerry Stackhouse (G); Jason Kidd (G)
Officials: Steve Javie, Rodney Mott, Scott Wall
Three things to watch:
1) LeBron James has to break out sooner or later. In the first three games of the season he’s averaging under 20 points per game. He doesn’t seem to be worried about it, but he needs to lead the way in scoring while he receives supporting play from those around him.
2) Turnovers, turnovers, turnovers. In two of the first three games, the Cavs have gone above their own established limits for not taking care of the ball. Not surprisingly, those are the two games that they’ve lost.
3) Mo Williams acknowledges that he’s not as comfortable in the Cavaliers’ offense as he’d like to be. His continued integration in the offense is essential tonight.
Quotable:
From the coach’s office:
Mike Brown on the Detroit trade:
”Trades happen all the time and they can happen any time. There have been a lot of them that caught you off guard and you say ‘Oh, wow. That’s interesting,’ This is one of them, but not necessarily one that I think could be unexpected period. It’s an interesting trade and I think it has a chance to help both ball clubs.’’
From the locker room:
Ben Wallace on his former team’s trade:
“I’m used to seeing Chauncey (Billups) in a different uniform. He’s been there before. He’ll be all right. He’s back home…We’ll be watching them to see what they’re doing.”
On Detroit whether losing big man Antonio McDyess will affect Detroit:
“It might. It might not. Maybe they feel the young guys are ready to play.
Post game:
Three keys to the win:
1) Mo Williams, after starting out a bit slow in the Cavaliers first few games, showed why the team traded for him in the off-season. Williams scored 14 points, dished out 6 assists and only had two turnovers to key the win. More importantly, he did much of his damage in the fourth quarter to key a 13-0 run by the Cavs to start the period. Williams created his own shot off the dribble and did most of it with LeBron James on the bench.
2) Defense. Defense. Defense. The Cavs held the Mavericks to just 40.8 percent shooting from the floor on 29-of-71 shots for the night. The blocked six shots and dominated the boards 52-35. They out hustled the Mavericks on both ends of the court. If you’re looking to pass out praise in this effort, look to Ben Wallace and Anderson Varejao who clamped down on Dirk Nowitzki, holding him to just 8 points on 3-of-11 shooting.
3) LeBron James got untracked – sort of. James scored a total of 29 points on 8-of-20 shooting for the game. Those numbers aren’t glowing but he drove to the basket aggressively drawing fouls from Mavericks. He hit 13-of-15 charity shots.
Quotable:
Coach Mike Brown on Mo Williams:
‘’Mo is a guy we feel who can go out there and create shots for himself and create shots for others and that’s what we did tonight. We just called his number at the top of the floor, put him in a couple of pick-and-roll situations and told them to sit with their hands ready because we felt he was going to score or make the right pass.’’
LeBron James on his game:
“I didn’t think I shot the ball particularly well from the field like I know I can. But I was able to get into the lane and knock down my free throws. I was in attack mode all night, taking some shots I know I can make and I felt good. The guys really took care of their business early in the fourth.
{ 13 comments… read them below or add one }
From what I’ve been reading, Denver intends to buy out McDyess and he’ll head back to Detroit.
More detail, George. Why does Williams “not feel comfortable” in the Cavaliers’ offense? Does he want the ball more? Does he want to shoot more? Is the pace too slow? What’s his beef?
i noticed as soon as detroit made that deal yahoo.com jackass wojnarowski had a “lebron leaving for detroit” article up immediately. ok buddy. lebron is leaving cleveland for another desolate great lakes city for less money. makes sense to me.
pfffffff
Alan:
He hasn’t looked comfortable. He always just says that it’s a learning process for him. New system. New teammates. He sure as heck looked comfortable tonight, though.
This was a great win for the Cavaliers. Brown is finally figuring out the need to keep either Lebron or Mo on the floor at all times (the same way Phil J. kept Pippen or Jordan on the floor). Like tonight this always gives them at least one shot creator in the line up. Great game by Big Ben showing he can still play a role and overall their defense first mentality is showing up much earlier than it did last year.
Regarding the detroit trade I think it hurts the Pistons. AI is not a team player, he is on the downside of his career, and he breaks up the chemistry of the Pistons which was one of their strengths. I just see this as a desperate move by a team on the decline. So I welcome it.
How is that Pistons trade a “desperate move by a team on the decline?” They may get McDyess back, Iverson is still an excellent player if he can stay in one piece, his fat contract expires at the end of this season, and Rodney Stuckey appears to be a damn good player who will play the point for years. They’re not on the decline. They could sign Boozer or Marion next summer, then still have plenty of cap room left for the summer of 2010. It’s a shame the Cavs can’t trade Ferry for Dumars.
I agree Alan that if the Pistons get McDyess back then it is a great trade for them. It would basically be a cash dump for the Nuggets.
The two problems I see so far are LeBron’s FG Percentage outside the lane. He is 5-34 including 3 attempts and hopefully he can get his shot to fall soon.
Also it seems like LeBron will actually slow the ball down a lot of times when we could be running if he gets the rebound. Maybe he is still stuck in 2007 Mike Brown mode.
I think once we do start running more Mo will fit right in and everyone will be happy. And I agree with Dave that Mo or LeBron has to be on the floor all of the time. Playmakers who can create their own shot are a necessary piece of any offense in the NBA.
if detroit gets mcdyess back, how is that any different from last year when Dallas wanted to trade stackhouse to get Kidd, then have the nets buy stackhouse out and he would return to dallas as a free agent after 30 days? the NBA didnt allow that to happen in that case. this is the exact same thing, no? i guess the only difference is somebody leaked the plan out and it was nixed. the nba needs to address this loophole. its a joke if a team includes a player in a trade to make it happen, knowing full well the player will get waived and will just return. the player should be off-limits to the original team for the rest of the season.
alan T – “Rodney Stuckey appears to be a damn good player who will play the point for years.” how do you know this? do you watch every pistons game to scout stuckey? hes been nothing more than a bench guy so far and has ok numbers. hes never been a starter and has never had big minutes. just because the national media is on his bandwagon doesnt mean hes going to pan out as a big time player. maybe he will – im just not ready to buy into his hype just yet.
i got to see a lot of his stuckey at eastern washington. sure, it is big sky conference basketball but stuckey outclassed the whole league in his first game as a freshman. it’s no shock he was able to integrate himself with the pistons so quickly. i think he is the real deal.
“Rodney Stuckey appears to be a damn good player who will play the point for years.” how do you know this?
How does he know this? Its quite simple….the player is not a Cleveland Cavalier. Rest assured, if he was a Cavalier, Stuckey would not have gotten a single complimentary word. The fact this player is not on the Cavs roster makes him all-world to Comaguy.
Tom, I won’t directly respond to the comments of Rick the Stalking Dick. But in answer to *your* question, I actually did watch a lot of Pistons games on the Detroit FOX Sports affiliate. Now I watch their games on League Pass. The streaming video sucks, but that’s besides the point.
I’m no expert on Rodney Stuckey, but the trade speaks for itself. Dumars has enough confidence in Stuckey to trade Billups. If he doesn’t re-up Iverson, Dumars wouldn’t just leave the team hanging without a point guard. Stuckey is their point guard of the future. And the plain fact of the matter is when Stuckey played last season, he was very effective, including in the playoffs against Boston. He’s a fairly big dude for a scoring point guard, too.
Dumars knows what he’s doing. With the exception of that Milicic thing, which he blew, Dumars keeps rolling sevens.
i miss brian windhorst.
I miss coma emergencies.
I miss Rick the Stalking Dick.
Oh, wait a minute. He’s here. Never mind.