Philadelphia 76ers at Dallas Mavericks  (December 5)

Samaki Walker started at power forward for the Mavs.  It was his first
start of his career and he became the youngest Mav to ever start.

Both teams started the first shooting pretty well and Allen Iverson showed
why he was the first pick over all.  Philly was draining 3s and I had
feared I would be seeing a repeat of the Miami game, but fortunately their
hot 3-point shooting only lasted 1 quarter.  Iverson was eating Jason Kidd 
alive, so Derek Harper was brought in to put some defensive pressure on 
Iverson and Harper played Iverson most of the rest of the game.  Kidd
received some boo's after he missed a open jumper and blew a layup.
Philadelphia led 29-24 after 1 and had connected on 5 3-pointers.  Iverson
had 13 points including 3 3-pointers.  Dallas committed 3 turnovers and
Philly had none.

It was the Jim Jackson and Oliver Miller show in the 2nd as Jackson scored 
10 points, gathered 5 rebounds, and dished 5 assists and Miller had a
number of blocks and disrupted Philly's play in the 2nd quarter to help 
give Dallas a 50-47 lead at halftime.  The Mavs had a team record 8 blocks
in the quarter.  Philly committed 5 turnovers in the quarter and Dallas
committed 3.

Philly had a couple of 7-0 runs in the 3rd and led 73-70 after 3.

Philly was up 92-90 with 3 minutes left.  Dallas went on a 9-0 run on a
layup by Jackson, a dunk by Miller, a 14-footer by Chris Gatling, a steal
and layup by Gatling, and a free throw by Kidd with 1:30 left to give 
Dallas a 99-92 lead.  The Mavs pushed that lead to 103-94 with 47 seconds 
left.  Amazingly (and embarassingly) the game was not over.  Lucious 
Harris hit a 3-pointer.  Kidd stole the ball and was fouled.  He made both 
free throws.  Philly got two points and the Mavs turned the ball over on 
the inbounds and Iverson made a basket and was fouled.  He made the extra 
point to cut Dallas' lead down to 105-102 with 30 seconds to go.  Philly 
let the Mavs run their play instead of intentionally fouling and it 
worked as George McCloud missed a 3-pointer as the clock was running down.
Mark Davis missed a quick 3-pointer with 6 seconds left.  Harper made 1 of 
2 free throws to end the scoring of the game.  Dallas 106, Philadelphia 
102.

Philly had 4 turnovers in the last 2:45 minutes and 6 in the 4th quarter.
Dallas had 2 steals in the last 3 minutes.   For the game, Dallas only had
9 turnovers.  Philly stayed in the game despite poor shooting due to
controlling the offensive boards - they had 24 for the game.  I was very
impress with Iverson.  He's not a point, but he's a heck of a talent and
is quick as can be - he made Kidd look slow at times.  Iverson finished
with 36 points, 11 assists, and 7 turnovers.  With 14 assists in this
game, Kidd has dished out 56 assists over the last 4 games (but only has
37 points).  There were 16 lead changes and 16 ties in the game.  The
Mavs' bench out-scored Philly's bench 52-15.
 

Quotes
Jim Cleamons: "Our defense finally gave a little spurt and we were able 
to hang on in the end.  I'm happy we won but there are still some things 
we have to do to be a good basketball team."

Cleamons: "We made the game closer at the end than it needed to be.
We made a couple of booboos.  Those are things we have to avoid if we 
want to become a mature team." 

Cleamons: "I haven't really diagnosed what [Samaki] did, but I think he
did well for the amount of time he was on the floor."

Jason Kidd: "This is what we've been trying to get accomplished all year, 
to get the confidence at the end of the game.  Tonight we got the job 
done."

Kidd: "This is what we've been trying to get accomplished all year, to 
get the confidence at the end of the game.  Tonight we got the job done."

Kidd: "I didn't hear the boos.  If I was a shooter, I'd be disappointed. 
But I'm not a shooter.  It's not about the four or five shots I missed 
early.  It's what happened at the end of the game."
 
Chris Gatling: "We're learning the hard way, but we got it done when it 
counted.  I guess we like to make things interesting, but our defense got 
the ball when we really needed it."

Derek Harper: "I told [Iverson] I would get [a steal].  Fortunately, the 
big steal came at the right time.  I got my hand on one and we were able 
to get control."

Harper on the trash talking with Iverson: "I started it.  Just trying to
get an edge, get to him some kind of way.  He has a lot of skills, he has
the green light to do whatever he wants.  He's tough for anybody in this
league.  More than anything, you have to challenge a guy like that."

Johnny Davis: "Again we had a chance to win a game and didn't get it done.
We are in most games, we just need to learn to finish games.  That will 
come.  We will start turning some of these games in our favor."

Allen Iverson: "We lost, and I had 7 turnovers.  that's a bad game.
Sounds like a bad game to me."

Phi-Dal boxscore