For the ninth straight time, Dallas beat Miami in the regular season, with No. 2 putting on a passing clinic that picked the Heat apart.
Hitting 60.3 percent of their shots, the Mavs blew out the Heat in a 111-96 drubbing. Jason’s team-high 11 assists constantly set his teammates up for easy layups or wide-open jumpers by beating the Mario Chalmers off of the dribble.
The Heat never led after the opening seconds of the game as the Mavs pored it on offensively throughout the game. Jason, who also finished with 7 points, 5 boards, 2 steals, and a team best +22, talked with Hoppsworld about the importance of finishing games.
“Early in the season, we’ve gotten up by double digits and we’ve let teams back in. Against Golden State on Wednesday, we got up by double digits and we kept it there, and tonight we did the same thing.”
TAKING CONTROL
After the blowout by the Celtics, Coach Carlisle and J.Kidd got together to figure out how to better the offense. The answer the came up with was to allow Jason to take over the play calling and so far it’s working amazingly.
For the first three months of the season, Carlisle called about 70 to 80 percent of the plays and No.2 took care of the rest. Now, that ratio is reversed and the offense has become much more potent with the Mavs scoring 117 and 111 points the last two games.
Carlisle talked about handing the reigns over to Jason with the Star-Telegram:
“He’s orchestrating what goes on, and I’ll help out a little bit here and there. He’s doing a great job of leading the guys who are out there on the court.”
“We really need him in that role as a leader, as a guy calling the shots out there.”
Jason himself feels much more comfortable with the offense now, as he told the Star-Telegram:
“I think I have a pretty good feel of where we need to get the ball,. The big thing is have everyone understand what we’re running.”
“Now, nobody has to look over and figure out what we’re running. We’ve tried to eliminate some of the steps of the process and just play.’‘
The switch to Jason calling the plays has led to a more freewheeling and fast paced offense that the team is excited about.
Antoine Wright told the Star-Telegram what he likes about having Jason in charge of the offense:
“Him and coach got together and figured out that’s the best way for us to play. Sometimes we have a tendency to just force it into Dirk.”
“J-Kidd is doing a better job of keeping our offense balanced. He puts everyone in the right position to get easy baskets.”
FANS CORNER
Fans have noticed the Mavs pace the last two games and are thankful for the fact that Jason is pushing the tempo. Here’s what fans have to say about the Mavs new-look offense on the Mavs Blog:
Posted by Billy Ray:
“Looks like Dirk is getting a better understanding of how to play with Kidd. Kidd makes life easier but if you work harder you can get a true rapport with him. Saw some stuff last night I hadn’t seen yet and it was impressive and elite and led me to believe that the combo could be real dangerous, like Stockton/Malone dangerous.”
Posted by Dirk Diggler:
“That’s all they needed to happen. Kidd is a genius in distributing the ball, especially calling the plays. NBA Championship her we come!”
NEXT UP
The Mavs continue their Florida road trip Monday night against the Orlando Magic at 5 pm. This marks the beginning of a tough stretch of games for the Mavs leading up to the All-Star break, as the last six opponents they will face are a combined 39 games over .500.
RELATED STORIES
Mavericks 111, Heat 96 (ESPN.com, Jan. 31st, 2009)
http://espn.go.com/nba/boxscore?gameId=290131014
Nowitzki leads as Mavericks crush Heat (Hoopsworld, Jan. 31st, 2009)
http://www.hoopsworld.com/TheWireStory.asp?id=16151
Mavericks Coach Rich Carlisle puts offense in Kidd’s hands (Star-Telegram, Feb. 1st, 2009)
http://www.star-telegram.com/287/story/1177438.html
Dallas Mavericks look forward to six-game challenge (Star-Telegram, Feb. 2nd, 2009)
http://www.star-telegram.com/287/story/1178198.html
Kidd now calls the shots (The Dallas Morning News, Feb. 1st, 2009)
http://mavsblog.dallasnews.com/archives/2009/02/kidd-now-calls-the-shots.html