Game 2: Dallas at New Orleans (April 22) Dallas started Game 2 the way they finished Game 1 - playing very poor defense. Dallas led 5-4 (their only lead of the game) with 10:15 remaining and the Hornets went on a 12-4 run to go up 16-9 with 6:25 left - the Hornets shot 5-6 FG over the last 2:45 of the run. The Mavs were able to keep the Hornets' lead in single-digits and a quick jumper by Jason Kidd pulled Dallas within 19-21 with 4:20 to go, but New Orleans rattled off the next 6 points. A 3-pointer by Jannero Pargo gave the Hornets their first double-digit lead at 37-26 with 10 seconds left, but Jerry Stackhouse answered with a 3 with 2 seconds left. But Dallas was again caught flat-footed as a half-court inbounds pass was made to Chris Paul and the Mavs paid him almost no mind as he quickly dribbled up and nailed the 18-footer at the buzzer. New Orleans led 39-29 after 1. It was a very poor Dallas defensive start as the Hornets shot 71% FG (17-24). Dallas shot a strong 58% (11-19) FG, but New Orleans got 5 more shot attempts thanks to an 11-5 rebounding edge. David West has 12 points and Paul had 6 points and 8 rebounds. Dirk Nowitzki had 9 points. New Orleans scored the first 3 points of the quarter and Dallas didn't not score until 3 minutes into the quarter. The Hornets led between 9 and 12 points over the next 7 1/2 minutes as neither team was able to mount a run. New Orleans led 59-49 with 1:45 left and closed the quarter with an 8-2 run as Dallas sent them to the line 4 straight times. New Orleans led 67-51 at the half. New Orleans shot 61.5% FG and Dallas shot 48.5% FG in the half. New Orleans out-scored Dallas 17-4 in fastbreak points. Avery Johnson made a change to open the 2nd half in starting Jason Terry instead of Jerry Stackhouse - it didn't make a difference. Nowitzki scored Dallas' first 7 points of the 3rd quarter, but New Orleans was able to keep pace and they led 73-58 with 9:30 to go. Paul hit a jumper and Peja Stojakovic hit a jumper and 3-pointer to give New Orlean's their first 20 point lead at 80-58 with 7:50 left. Devean George had a dunk, Morris Peterson hit a 3-pointer, Brandon Bass hit 2 free throws, and Peterson hit another 3-pointer to give New Orleans an 86-62 lead with 6;15 remaining. Bass scored 5 straight points, but the Hornets answered with 7 straight points to go up 97-72 with 1:10 to go. Terry hit a 3-pointer at the quarter buzzer. New Orleans led 99-79 after 3. Once again, it was lights-out shooting for the Hornets as they shot 13-19 FG in the 3rd quarter. Bass had 13 points and 4 rebounds in the 3rd. To give Dallas credit, they did play well in spurts in the 4th quarter instead of just throwing in the towel, but even so, they were unable to pull closer than 16 points (4 times). New Orleans went on a 7-2 mini-run to re-take a 20 point lead at 112-91 with 5:55 remaining. A 3-pointer by Terry made it an 18-point game, but New Orleans then scored the next 7 points to go up 122-97 with 3:45 left and both teams pulled their starters. The scrubs scored 5 straight points to give New Orleans their largest lead at 127-99 with 2:30 to go. New Orleans won 127-103. New Orleans leads the series 2-0. It was another dismal performance by the Mavs. Their defense was completely lacking and it almost impossible to win when you allow your opponent to shot 60% FG. And it is impossible to win when they out-score you in each quarter. Give the Hornets full credit - they played great again and again showed why they are the #2 seed. The Mavs will trot out the old sayings of all the Hornets did was what they were supposed to do - hold homecourt. But the Mavs will have to play much, much, much better for this not to be a really short series. Dallas will also take solace in that the Hornets have not won in Dallas since 1998 (when they were the Charlotte Hornets) - 13 straight losses at the AAC and Reunion Arena. As for the numbers from this game, the Hornets shot 60.8% (48-79) FG including 10-18 3-pointers and Dallas shot 47.1% (33-70) FG including 7-14 3-pointers. New Orleans shot 21-28 FT and Dallas shot 30-39 FT. New Orleans only had 4 offensive rebounds - but you don't need those when you are shooting so well. The Mavs did have a rebounding edge in out-rebounding the Hornets 38-31 including 10-4 offensive. The Hornets were once again fairly clean with the ball and only had 7 turnovers while Dallas had 16 turnovers. Chris Paul once again had an excellent outing. He had a double-double in the 1st half and finished with 32 points on 10-16 FG and 12-14 FT, 5 rebounds, 17 assists, and 3 steals (he did up his turnovers from 1 in Game 1 to 3 in this game). David West didn't struggle with his shot in this game and had 27 points including 11-17 FG, 4 rebounds, and 5 assists. Peja Stojakovic had his stroke going and had 22 points including 5-7 3-pointers. Tyson Chandler had a double-double with 10 points and 11 rebounds. He also had 3 blocks. The game was so out of control that it was hardly noticed when Chandler picked up his 5th foul midway through the 3rd quarter. All 5 starters were in double-digits scoring. Jannero Pargo contributed 10 points off the bench. Hilton Armstrong had 8 points including 3-4 FG and Bonzi Wells had 4 points on 2-3 FG (but missed 2 free throws) and 4 rebounds in 19 minutes each. Julian Wright had 2 points and Ryan Bowen didn't score. Dirk Nowitzki again played well (but not great) but didn't get enough help. He had 27 points on 7-11 FG and 12-15 FT, 5 rebounds, and 5 assists. Brandon Bass had a very nice 3rd quarter where he scored 13 of his 19 points and had 4 of his 8 rebounds. He shot a perfect 5-5 FG and 9-9 FT. 10 of Jason Terry's 16 points came during a span of 7 minutes from the end of the 3rd quarter into the 4th quarter. He shot 4-5 3-pointers and had 4 assists in 31 minutes. Josh Howard had another poor outing with just 10 points including 3-10 FG. He did have 7 rebounds, though. No other Mav was in double-digits. Jason Kidd had 7 points on 3-10 FG, 4 rebounds, and 8 assists. Jerry Stackhouse had 9 points on 4-10 FG and 3 rebounds in 24 minutes. That's 14-31 FG from 3 of the starters. Erick Dampier had 6 points and 6 rebounds in 16 minutes. Eddie Jones had 3 points and Devean George had 5 points in a little over 10 minutes playing time each. Malik Allen and Antoine Wright didn't score in the Mavs playoff debuts. And Juwan Howard had 1 point in the final 4 minutes of garbage time. Quotes [Scott's, Paul's, West's, Johnson's, and Nowitzki's quotes transcribed by me] Bryon Scott: "Well, first of all, I thought our defensive game was pretty good. But, obviously, tonight we were clicking pretty well on the offensive end. It was probably one of the better offensive games we've had. But we will still go over some of the things on the defensive end that we had some miscues on." Scott: "We've just held serve. You know, we've done what we were supposed to do as far as trying to keep homecourt advantage. That's all we've done. That's the only thing we've accomplished so far in this series." Scott on defending New Orleans when their offense is going so well: "I don't know. I mean, you could put an extra defender out there, I guess, but I don't know if they're going to allow that. But, you know, right now the way we played tonight and the way CP [Paul] was able to navigate through the defense and then find open guys and Peja and Mo [Peterson] and David and all those guys were making all those shots, it makes it tough. So, I can't answer your question, I'm sorry." Scott on the good start: "Yeah, like I said, how we've been pretty much all season long. You could tell the first game - you know, especially the first half - young group of guys that had never been in this situation before, we had some jitters. We got rid those at halftime [of game 1], I think the guys felt pretty good, even though we were down 12. We knew we missed a lot of open shots that we normally make. You know, Peja shooting a couple of airballs, David 1-8 [FG]. So we felt pretty good tonight know if we got those same shots, we were going to be in great shape. We just wanted to make sure defensively that we kept our intensity. And we knew it was going to be a little bit more physical than it was the last game." Scott on Dallas' defense on Paul: "Well, you got to ask him how he dealt with them. I mean, he's the one that's beating people, you know, down there. But again, Chris understands that if they're going to double-team him with big guys that he has an opportunity with his speed and size to get by that guys. And if he gets by them, like I said, it puts a whole lot of pressure on their defense to protect the paint. And when you're doing that, again, you're leaving Mo and Peja and David West out there open. So, you know, he did an unbelievable job of attacking, scoring, and being the distributor and those guys got open shots. And, like I said, the difference is tonight we made them on a consistent basis." Scott: "I thought we were fresher. We looked like we had some more pep in our step tonight. I made the comment to our coaches that it was about the best I've seen us run, you know, transition-wise when we got rebounds. And the way we ran the floor tonight, it's the best I've seen for a while. Obviously, the couple of days off helped us, you know, and being a young group of guys, I think right now that they understand that our transition game has to be A+ tonight. And I thought we really looked to attack them and we got to the free throw line. I know that we're not probably going to get to the free throw line as much as they do, but as long as we can stay some where close, then we feel we got a great chance." Scott on Game 3 in Dallas: "Just that: it's in Dallas. You know, they've been pretty good at home. They've been pretty good all season long at home. I know that we haven't won there in a while. So, just a different atmosphere. When you got the homecourt advantage behind you, it helps. So we're expecting to go in there and have 2 very, very difficult games. But, again, our guys are looking forward to it." Scott on comparing Paul to Magic Johnson: "He's been pretty good. I think he's averaging about 34 [points] a game and about 14 assists. So, he's doing pretty good. Magic, again, Magic was a triple-double type guy every single night, it seems like. But sitting there and watching Chris really developing into the best point guard in this league, it's amazing to watch how he's risen his game to another level, you know, for the playoffs. But that's what great players do. And I think he's definitely one of the best on this league right now." Chris Paul on going to Dallas: "Yeah, we're not blind to the fact that, shoot, Muggsy [Bogues] was probably running the point the last time we won in Dallas. And we understand that we have a great opportunity to go in there and go up 3-0 and we just got to accept the challenge and just play the game." Paul: "Definitely, I think our coaches did an outstanding job of preparing us. And DWest kept telling me, leading up to this game, 'CP, they try to trap you, we're going to make plays. We're going to make plays.' And that's what they did early in the game." Paul on the trap: "They came a little bit earlier. All ball screens and things like that, they trapped. But, like I said, I got rid of the ball; MoPete, DWest, Peja, those guys made shots and it really got them out of it." Paul: "One thing I've learned from watching a lot of these games and playing throughout the season is that you have to be aggressive. If I just sit back and let them trap me, then they've succeeded in what they wanted to do. So, I know I have to pick my spots when I give the ball up and let other guys go, but at the same time, I have to still be aggressive and attack - and that's what we did." Paul: "Well, the pick-and-roll has been great for us all year. If you've watched us play, that's when we're at our best, because when Tyson picks that screen, you've got to pick your poison. I'm coming off aggressive. DWest is spotting up, Peja, Mo, Tyson at the rim. So when we're clicking on all cylinders like tonight, it's tough to defend us." David West: "Ya, we didn't want to wait. We didn't want to be on our heels at any time during the game. So our mindset was to come out with an aggressive mentality. You know, obviously Dallas is a tough team because their ability to make shots and things like that. So we just didn't want to give them any life." West: "I think the guys came in, we had the right mindset in terms of how to approach the game the right way. We knew that they were going to try some gimmick stuff with him [Paul]. It was key that we had the confidence, you know, when the ball is out of his hands, for us to make plays. Peja hit some shots, Mo was able to hit some shots. It really disrupted what they were trying to do." Avery Johnson: "Well early on, everything we tried on Paul didn't work. You know, we wanted to come out and get the ball out of his hands, we tried that. He split us a couple of times, got away from us. And then, the main thing was their other guys stepped up big for them tonight. You know, they were playing 4-on-3 a couple of times, which we wanted them to do, and Peterson made shots, Chandler caught lobs on us, and they really jumped out on us in that 1st quarter." Johnson: "Where do we go? Oh, we're going back to Dallas. And we're going back in front of our home crowd. And we'll take a look at some things, but we got to have a better effort than what we had tonight. And offensively, you know, we have to move the ball a little more and execute. But, where do we go from here: we're going home. And home has been good for us. And we've got to go home and get some home cooking. And that's what we need right now." Johnson: "Again, they protected their homecourt. We have a chance to go home and do the same thing. You know, I've been saying all along, they are a #2 seed that deserves to be #2. And we've got to play much better than we've played in these first 2 games." Johnson on Paul: "We've got to do a better job of denying him the ball back. But at the same times, you know, he's pretty quick. And the easiest thing to do for our guards is not just deny him the ball. Just because you try to deny him the ball, he's not going stop and give in. He's a very strong minded and tough player. You know, he's quick to the ball. And sometimes you need 2 guys to try to deny him the ball and I'm not sure that's the easiest thing to do. I just think we got to really do a better job of being much more physical with him in our traps, physical with him on his drives. We've got to do a better job of screening him when he's on defense. You know, he just roams around on defense and disrupts our offense. So, we'll get it. We'll take a look at it again on video. We got 2 games to look at now. And our men are disappointed, but, again, you'll see a different team for Game 3." Johnson: "Well, in general, our men our competitors and they don't want the results that we've had in these first 2 games. I thought that we had a pretty decent 1st half in Game 1 and not so good of a 2nd half. But tonight, man, it was just an awful 1st quarter and they pretty much had us on our heels at that point." Johnson: "Well, hopefully it'll be more energy. Hopefully we'll do a better job of paying attention to some small details that can lead to big miscues. Hopefully we can be much more physical than what we've been here. Again, we're going to work on it. We're going to make sure everybody's on the same page. But we've got to bring energy, concentration, enthusiasm to our game plan. And once we do that, then we'll have a chance to turn it around. And then we're not going try to come out - you know, you're not going to win the series in one quarter or one half or one game. Right now, I just think we need to stop worrying about that and start being more concerned about playing quarters and halves and details. We had a group in there for a stretch there in the 2nd half where I thought we played the right way for about 3 minutes or so - but, hey, 3 minutes is not going to be good enough." Johnson on Kidd: "Well, again, it's not one person. It's a team game. And collectively, you know, the whole team has to do a better job on both ends." Dirk Nowitzki: "Yeah, I mean, obviously disappointing loss. You know, after the first game, we definitely wanted to get this one. And we just didn't go for it. They still out-hustled us to loose balls. But, you've got to give them credit. I mean, they were on fire tonight. Paul had his thing going again, but their shooters were on fire, Peja, West. So they really had us strung out there. So, I mean, you can't give up 130 points and expect to win." Nowitzki on being down 0-2: "Not the position we want to be in. I mean, no question, we thought for sure we had a great chance to win 1 game here, but you know. Now we got to go home. It sounds dumb, but we got to take one game at a time. Hopefully win that 3rd game, put some pressure on them. You know, hopefully rely on our fans. I think we've been great at home all season long. So definitely that 3rd game is a game that we want to win and then we'll go from there." Nowitzki: "Like I said, they had it really going in every direction. In transition, if you don't get back, if you don't matchup right, Peja's going to make you pay. He's going to run right to that 3-point line. He was on fire. Then in the halfcourt set, they put the ball in to Paul's hands. We tried to trap him some early, but if West is going to be wide open at the top of the key, he's making his shots. Mo Peterson came in made some shots. So it's tough to get the ball out of his hands if the shooters are shooting like that. Chandler runs right to the front of the rim, got a couple of lobs there. So when we did double-team Paul, he still got his thing. He's really making his in-between jumper this series. Hadn't really seen him make it that consistently, but he's really making it thus far. Yeah, they were great offensively and we just got to pick it up." Nowitzki: "I still think we have what it takes to win this series. So I'm not going to throw everything out the window. We just got to attack more on both ends of the floor. Everybody's got to be in attack mode, be aggressive. And hopefully we can pull this Game 3 out. No matter how we're going to get it, we got to win that game and put some pressure on them. I still think we have what it takes, we've just got to go out there and prove it." Nowitzki on Kidd: "Yeah, like I said, it's hard to get him the ball in transition if we got to take the ball out of bounds every time. And that was the case in 2nd half of Game 1 and that was the case tonight basically all game long. If you to take the ball out, your transition is basically gone - and that is where he's at his best, you know, creating in the open court, finding shooters, slashing, and really running the team. So hopefully in Game 3, with our crowd, we can get some stops and speed the game up some and we'll be all right." Jason Kidd: "We've shown that we can defend and we've shown that we can give up a lot of points. We've got to find that team that was defending there for a while. Even when we lost those close games, we were defending. We have it in us." Jason Terry: "We just got out-played, out-fought, and out-worked. They out-worked us on both ends of the floor. We're in the hole now 0-2, but we're going home and we've got to take care of business at home." Terry: "We just got out-played and out-fought. They out-worked us on both ends of the floor. We have to play a lot harder and just fight. We have a lot of guys with pride in this locker room. When you take a butt-kicking like that, you can only dig deep and come out swinging." Terry: "We're a good team, man, whether it looks like it now or not. We're not stunned. They're a good team. They won 2 here. We've got to go home and take care of business." Terry on Paul: "You're not really going to stop him. You've just got to make him work and limit him getting other people the ball." Jerry Stackhouse: "Obviously, we wanted to come in here and get a win. We've been in a worse situation. It's not ideal, but it can be done. We'd like to try to even this series coming back here." Stackhouse: "They're beating us - that's all we can say. They're beating us and we have to find a way to turn the tide. It's basketball and things can swing. We've seen it happen before, not only in our favor but against us." Stackhouse on Paul: "He's the head of the snake for that team. He's playing like it. We just got to do some things to take away his confidence. But it's not like it's uncharted territory. We've played against teams that have had players who have been hot during a series and still been able to manage to win the series. We just need to get home and get some home cooking." Brandon Bass: "We've got to continue to work and defend better, but we put a hand in their face tonight, they just made shots. Chris made plays and he put the ball in the right places and he was successful. You can watch every game they played this season and they made shots, but tonight was one of those nights were they made most of their shots. I haven't looked at a stat sheet, but they must have made 70% of their shots." 2008 NBA Playoffs, First Round, Game 2 New Orleans Hornets 127, Dallas Mavericks 103 at New Orleans (April 22) 1st 2nd 3rd 4th - Final 2FG 3FG FG% FT% New Orleans 39 28 32 28 - 127 .623 .556 .608 .750 Dallas 29 22 28 24 - 103 .464 .500 .471 .769 Halftime: New Orleans 67-51 3rd Q: New Orleans 99-79 Technicals: New Orleans defensive 3 seconds 5:22 2nd, Tyson Chandler (NO) 9:28 3rd, Erick Dampier 9:28 3rd, New Orleans defensive 3 seconds 0:58 4th Refs: Joey Crawford, Greg Willard, Courtney Kirkland Attendance: 17,855 (sellout) IL: New Orleans - Chris Andersen, Melvin Ely Dallas - J.J. Barea, Tyronn Lue, Jamaal Magloire New Orleans Hornets REB Player MIN FGM-FGA 3PM-3PA FTM-FTA PTS O-T AST TO PF STL BLK Peja Stojakovic 37 8-13 5-7 1-2 22 0-2 2 0 2 0 0 David West 40 11-17 1-1 4-4 27 0-4 5 1 4 1 0 Tyson Chandler 28 4-7 0-0 2-2 10 3-11 0 0 5 0 3 Morris Peterson 22 5-7 2-4 0-0 12 0-2 0 0 1 0 0 Chris Paul 39 10-16 0-2 12-14 32 0-5 17 3 5 3 0 Jannero Pargo 22 4-8 2-4 0-0 10 0-0 4 1 2 2 0 Hilton Armstrong 20 3-4 0-0 2-4 8 0-2 0 0 3 0 2 Bonzi Wells 19 2-3 0-0 0-2 4 1-4 1 1 3 2 0 Julian Wright 10 1-3 0-0 0-0 2 0-1 0 0 0 0 0 Ryan Bowen 4 0-1 0-0 0-0 0 0-0 1 0 0 1 0 Totals 48 48-79 10-18 21-28 127 4-31 30 7 25 9 5 Dallas Mavericks REB Player MIN FGM-FGA 3PM-3PA FTM-FTA PTS O-T AST TO PF STL BLK Josh Howard 28 3-10 0-1 4-6 10 3-7 2 0 4 0 0 Dirk Nowitzki 36 7-11 1-1 12-15 27 1-5 5 4 3 0 1 Erick Dampier 16 3-6 0-0 0-0 6 1-6 0 1 3 0 0 Jerry Stackhouse 24 4-10 1-3 0-0 9 0-3 2 2 4 1 0 Jason Kidd 31 3-10 1-2 0-0 7 2-4 8 1 3 2 0 Brandon Bass 29 5-5 0-0 9-9 19 3-8 0 3 2 1 0 Jason Terry 31 5-8 4-5 2-2 16 0-2 4 2 2 0 0 Eddie Jones 11 1-3 0-1 1-1 3 0-0 0 0 2 0 0 Malik Allen 11 0-1 0-0 0-0 0 0-0 0 0 4 0 0 Devean George 12 2-5 0-1 1-2 5 0-2 0 0 0 2 0 Antoine Wright 7 0-0 0-0 0-0 0 0-1 0 2 0 0 0 Juwan Howard 4 0-1 0-0 1-4 1 0-0 0 0 1 0 0 Totals 48 33-70 7-14 30-39 103 10-38 21 16 28 6 1 patricia Go mavs!