A Night of Chutes and Ladders

Remember how the Dallas Mavericks lost to the Washington Wizards the other night? The Lakers probably would have liked to play that team.

I understand the Lakers were without Pau Gasol. But that was one of the most impressive wins I can remember for the Mavericks against the Lake Show, especially at the Staples Center.

On the other surface, the Stars continued their woeful play at home with a disheartening 6-5 shootout loss to the Florida Panthers.

Yes, the Stars managed to fight back and earn a point. That doesn’t matter. A home game against the Florida Panthers has to be two points. Are the Sharks going to give a point away there? I don’t think so.

Each game in more detail after the jump.

Mavs 94, Lakers 80 – There was never a point in this game (except for maybe the 10-0 run in the 2nd half) where the Mavs weren’t in control. Pretty much from the opening tip, the Mavs controlled the tempo of the game.

Dirk may have been a little off in the first half,  but there’s a reason the Mavs made their run when he got hot in the third quarter. Herr (or is it Hair?) Dirk finished with 21 points and ten rebounds, including 10-11 from the free throw line.

Not a great game in the scoring department for Jason Kidd, although he did add 11 assists. Jason Terry had a strong effort off the bench, pouring in 16 including three 3-pointers.

All of those numbers are great. The three faces of this team each did what they needed to do in order for the Mavs to pick up the win.

But the most impressive effort was from the newest face: Shawn Marion.

I’m not totally sure I buy into the plus/minus stat for basketball, but ESPN does feature it in its postgame box score, so they obviously buy into it enough to put it on there. I do love it for hockey, but I’m a little unsure of its use in a basketball stat sheet.

The point is this: Shawn Marion led the Mavs in +/- tonight with a +37. So the Dallas Mavericks outscored the Los Angeles Lakers by 37 points when Shawn Marion was on the floor.

I’ve already forgotten what the Mavs traded to get him.

I vote the Mavs start wearing those new blue alternate jerseys more often. In fact, I would be completely fine with just having the two jerseys that looked like tonight’s. Wear the green at home and blue on the road. I’ve never cared for the real jerseys anyway. Change the blues to say ‘Dallas’ in that font, and everything is all good.

If nothing else, they sure looked a lot better than the Silver Disaster.

Finally, it’s not often the Mavs get to throw in Matt Carroll and Rodrigue Beaubois against the Lakers. It’s easy to see what everybody likes about Roddy. He’s only 21 but he looks smooth and in control of the game. Maybe it was only two minutes. Maybe I can’t find anything truly negative to write about this game.

Whatever it is, I think Beaubois looks like a player. He sure looks fast enough.

Panthers 6, Stars 5 (SO) – If only the Dallas Stars could play every game on the road, they’d be unstoppable. Because when they’re at home, they’re a disaster.

Tonight’s game continued an extremely disheartening trend for the Dallas Stars: they just don’t play well at home. In six games at home this year, there has been one good game – the 6-0 blowout of the Predators.

Other than that you’re looking at the team’s only two regulation losses, two shootout losses and an overtime win against the worst team in hockey.

Yet on the road, this team finds a way to get it done. While they dropped an overtime game to the Kings last week, they bookended that with impressive wins at Anaheim and St. Louis. I’m not quite sure what this team needs to do, because they clearly have the talent to skate with good teams. The early Canadian road trip and win in Chicago proves that.

But until this team figures out how to play at home, they won’t be much higher than the middle of the conference. Perhaps all they need is Mike Modano and Jere Lehtinen to come back and teach the kids how to play at home.

Tonight’s game could have been one of many others. Get down early, but manage to find a way to scratch and claw back to pick up a point.

That strategy is fine on the road. If the Stars pick up at least a point in 30 of their road games, that would be great. Assuming wins in 20-23 of those, that comes out to about 50-53 points. That would be great. Anything above 50 points through the NHL road schedule should be met with celebration.

But right now it looks like the Stars won’t be able to get more than about 40-45 at home. That won’t get it done.

The most frustrating part of the Stars’ season? It’s clear they have talent. But they can’t turn that into consistent winning efforts every night.

I’m excited about the season. The Stars have a chance to do some great things, but I’m beginning to get a little worried that this team can’t get two points when it needs them.

Jet pic: nba.com

Dirk pic: nachodonut.com

Silver Unis pic: usatoday.com

Morrow pic: hfboards.com