The Dallas Mavericks finally picked up their first win of the season, dispatching the Toronto Raptors 139-129 Sunday night in Dallas. The Mavericks move to 1-3 and released some clear pent up frustrations on Raptors roster that truly felt defenseless against everything the Mavericks threw at them.
It didn’t feel like that early on, as Toronto scored the first four points of the game, and the teams continually traded buckets for the remainder of the first quarter and first half. Dallas had 11 first half turnovers, which fueled Toronto in transition and on the secondary break — it was hard for the Mavericks big defense to set itself up in the halfcourt when the Mavericks offense was continually putting the Raptors at light speed.
Dallas trailed 66-64 at halftime, and the second half didn’t start much better, with the Raptors racing out to a seven point lead in the first few minutes of the third quarter. Something clicked after that however, and it was all Dallas after that. The Mavericks answered the Raptors immediately with a 7-0 run to tie the game, then just blew the Raptors off the floor for the rest of the quarter and start of the fourth. Cooper Flagg had a huge run in the third, dishing an alley-oop pass and having a monster dunk plus the foul in transition.
Dallas corrected the first-half turnover mistakes, and once the Raptors didn’t have easy outlets for points on the break, the entire game changed. Dallas also punished Toronto in transition in the second half, turning the tables on the Raptors. Toronto played some abhorrent transition defense, but credit the Mavericks for continually looking to push ahead with a pass.
There was a slight scare in the final two minutes once each team emptied their benches, but Dallas held on. They move on to play the Oklahoma City Thunder on the second night of a back-to-back on Tuesday.
Check back later tonight for more thoughts on this Mavericks win.
See More:
* [Mavericks Game Coverage](/dallas-mavericks-game-coverage)
* [Mavericks Scores](/mavericks-scores-results)