Real Contender: Dallas Mavs. What do we need to do, to have a shot ?

[gpap]

Olynyk will feel like he'll be looking into a mirror when he sees Dirk.

[fairweatherfan]

We need a sweet old-school hip hop music video:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M01_ykXJ3mc

[Onslaught]

Olynyk will feel like he'll be looking into a mirror when he sees Dirk.

They are both ugly that's for sure. That's about it on similarities.

[gpap]

Olynyk will feel like he'll be looking into a mirror when he sees Dirk.

They are both ugly that's for sure. That's about it on similarities.

Lol

[KeepRondo]

Olynyk will feel like he'll be looking into a mirror when he sees Dirk.

They are both ugly that's for sure. That's about it on similarities.

I can't stand KO's hair. It's almost as bad as Kaman's old hairdo.

It makes it hard to take him seriously with that hair.

[jaketwice]

Any chance vs the Mavs?
They went 48 wins last season and have now added Parsons, Tyson Chandler and Jameer Nelson, and Nelson is looking smooth in that pick and roll with Dirk and Tyson.

They are a far superior team to the Rockets and now that we've learned from that Rockets game- it's time to step up and see if we have the focus and discipline to stay with the Mavs through three quarters- and see what happens in the fourth.
I hope this team finds its identity, as Scalabrine suggested they seemed to lose against the Rockets- which is a great point.

What is that identity?
Well, it's what makes the Stevens system so great, similarly to Popovich's schemes on the Spurs, it's an aggressive system based on taking the initiative rather than reacting to your opponents- that way, you're trying not to react to the one or two franchise players every moves, you're trying make them react to you, always one step behind like a poor poker player.
Unfortunately against Houston, our players went into reaction mode very quickly. Be it nerves, or the first game on the road, they produced what can only be described as stage fright + late night in Marcus Smart's home town with airballs, terrible shooting and D-League level defense at multiple stages throughout the night.

-Stick to the three point strategy and open up the paint once a few threes go down.
The idea behind this is to wear out the Mavs early by making Ellis, Dirk and Chandler RUN their asses off in the first 2 quarters trying to defend the perimeter with pinpoint multiple accuracy...at the same time, make sure Sully or Olynyk/Bass get some action in the paint. Sullinger will have Chandler on him and he has dominated Chandler against New York.- let him try and draw a few easy fouls to disjoint the Mavs defense early. The key to our aggressive offense is ball movement from side to side, and as a natural side effect we'll get the wide open three point shots that are crucial to hitting early in the game to get a shooting groove going and take the crowd out of it early, which in turn will turn to room for our wings to attack the basket heading towards the first time out session.

- Focus on defense but don't get rattled early with a few fouls called against us.
- run the pick and roll with Rondo and our bigs.
- put Marcus Smart out there to guard the Mavs pick and roll and experience guarding the pick  and roll against HOF pick n roll opponents. The Mavs are like a pick and roll coach's wet dream.
- Be physical but smart from the onset. Sullinger needs to overpower Tyson Chandler early and get him frustrated- Chandler's a sensitive player psychologically and he's easy to throw off.
- Make Ellis and Parsons shoot the threes and jumpshots early on- just make it the teams job to deny Dirk outside and Chandler on the pick and roll.
- Rebounding will be crucial to making the Mavericks run around and burn out early- without those rebounds we don't have any fast breaks or quick outlet passes which is a strength of ours with our youth, speed and coaching to get easy buckets/to the line with mismatches or easy fouls which will hopefully soften their defense early on. Of course the other cream on top is that is usually results in a boatload of wide open transition threes which we will not get without pounding the boards- Rondo's gotta be all over those boards and hitting Green and Olynyk with Peyton Manning lazers from one end to the other.

Couldn't be bothered going on any longer but those are some things to watch out for.

Ad your thoughts or things you'd like to see or think we will see

I gave you a TP for getting me excited about this game. The Mavs promise to be an interesting team this year. ...given our abundance of point guards, I think the only way to win is to run. Dallas rates to have big problems with on ball defense.

[Beat LA]

Depending on the fact that the officials couldn't possibly call a game as bad as the Houston horror the other night, I have to believe we have a good chance at beating the Mavs as long as everyone is still dialed in to the game plan from the opener!!!

Oh god, never say that.  We always get screwed playing the Mavs because Dirk gets so many ridiculous calls just like Duncan, Wade, Lebron, Kobe, and Durant, etc.  I wish that we would just attack him, because he's never been a good defender or rebounder, and he certainly isn't going to block shots.  It just always baffles me how everyone always asks, "how are we going to defend Dirk?" when we should be thinking of how we can go at him, particularly in the post, get him in foul trouble, and then we won't have to worry about him.  It's not that hard, imo.  We never even attempted to make him play post defense when KG was here.  Ugh. 

That aside, our only advantage is Rondo, and we're probably going to get murdered again, but I'd like to see Sully and KO make Dirk play defense for at least the majority of the game.  How big of a defensive liability does someone have to be before someone says, "hey, wait a minute..." .

[Quetzalcoatl]

When Dallas beat the Heat that year, Dirk became above criticism from me.  Frankly, they're on another level than the Celtics and it would be cool if we beat them, but I'm really not counting on it.

In any case, we're better than we were last year, so that's good.  Once we start playing the East Coast teams, it's going to be like taking weights off. 

[flybono]

Dallas by 19

No Chance. Continue to showcase Rondo, Bass and Green.