Life is good in the DFW area tonight.
Mavericks cap off their opening round series with a 106-93 victory in San Antonio, ending the Spurs playoff run on their home court for the second time in 4 seasons. Dallas is the only team in the Duncan era to end the Spurs' playoffs in San Antonio.
This game tonight came down to the 3 point shot. San Antonio couldn't defend it and they couldn't make it. Dallas shot 10-20 from downtown (4 of 9 from Kidd and 3 of 5 from Terry) and the Spurs shot 3 of 16. Everything else in the game came out pretty even. This is the one area where the Spurs were really dominated. As I said at the beginning of the series, one of the most important things the Mavericks had to do in order to win this series was defend the 3 point shot. Other than game 1, the Mavs did a good job defending the 3. With the way Parker was killing them for this series, they couldn't have afforded to allow the 3 point shot to fall.
It was good to see Jet start making some shots tonight and Dirk finally had a breakout game with his 31 points and 9 rebounds.
Tonight was a great ensemble performance. Everyone contributed and you never had a doubt that the Mavs would win this game. San Antonio never led and the game was only tied once and that was at 0-0.
Big ups to Rick Carlisle for what he did here. I thought Dallas would win this series, but I didn't think they would be able to do it in 5 games. They did and they did it in a very impressive manner. Carlisle was sharp all series, keeping the team motivated, picking the right spots for his timeouts to squash momentum in games and making some really nice rotation decisions for the lineups.
Also, I was quite impressed with the off the ball movement of the players tonight. Especially Dirk, who was able to create open looks away from the play on a consistent basis tonight.
The Mavericks will now sit around and wait for the winner of the Nuggets/Hornets series. I suspect that Denver will end the series tomorrow night. We shall see.
Now on to those pesky Texas Rangers.
You have to love what Kevin Millwood is doing right now and the grit and fight that the team is showing these last couple of weeks.
They pull out another win this evening, 5-4 over the A's.
Millwood was far from perfect this evening. He scattered 10 hits and gave up two walks in 8 innings, but he consistently worked out of jams and was able to keep his cool despite some truly suspect defense behind him this evening. The infield especially was playing...odd. There were about 3 or 4 balls that rolled right under the gloves of the infield or something they simply misjudged and thus didn't get a correct read on to pick up.
Still, Millwood managed to go 8 innings and despite only 5 hits from the offense while he was pitching, they made the most of those opportunities and scored 5 runs. I would still like to see more consistent hitting for Millwood's excellent pitching work.
After falling behind 3-1, Texas had a 3 run 6th led by two run single from Salty. However, Millwood gave up a home run to lead off the 7th inning and that tied it up at 4. Millwood only allowed 1 hit the rest of the way and Nelly Cruz hit the go-ahead RBI single in the 8th with 1 out scoring Hank Blalock to put them up for good.
If you go into the 9th with a lead, you feel good about your chances thanks to Frankie Francisco. He pitched a perfect 9th inning, needing only 6 pitches. He continues his impressive season, still not allowing a run.
Now, two unsettling things from this evening. Ian Kinsler went hitless again. That makes him 0 for his last 16.
The other is that of Josh Hamilton. I haven't even addressed his absence yet, because the Rangers had said it was nothing, but this is the third game in a row he's missed due to sore ribs. The team doctors will give him another 48 hours to see how he progresses, but it appears he could be headed for the DL. Not something you want when you're facing a stretch of division games this early.
Vicente Padilla takes the hill tomorrow against the Athletics at 7:05 sharp.
So, keep an eye on the Nuggets/Hornets game and see if Josh Hamilton is in the lineup tomorrow against the A's.
Until next time...
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