Mavs 90 Jazz 87 Grades: Dirk Carries Injured Mavs Josh Howard? Out (game time scratch due to his strained hamstring)! Devin Harris starts, but leaves the game after 6 minutes as he re-aggravates his quadriceps injury. Adrian Griffin strains his hamstring in the fourth quarter driving the basket. Keith Van Horn is still out with a strained knee MCL. The Mavs go into the half up 51 to 40, but the Jazz charge out of the halftime locker room and the Mavs struggle to score. Indeed, in the first 8 minutes of the third stanza, the Mavs had managed only 7 points. The Mavs manage to weather the Jazz barrage though, and manage to start the fourth period up 5 points at 68-63. The Jazz score 6 straight points to open the fourth to take their first lead of the game forcing an Avery timeout. Out of the timeout, Jason nails a trey to take the lead back, but Boozer ties the game up at 71 all. The Mavs then go on a 10-0 run in the next 4.5 minutes to put the game away. Great win in the face of the injuries, but no time to feel good as the Mavs face the Kings tomorrow night. Bob Ortegal got the quote of the night from Jerry Stackhouse right after the game when asked about the Mavs injury situation : "We don't need no excuses, we got five". UPN 21 : A++; UPN is on the money! Excellent camera work! +36 Johnson: B-, Avery had the Mavs ready to go tonight in the first half, unfortunately the same couldn?t be said for the second half. Nevertheless, Avery survived due to Dirk taking care of business in spite of Johnson?s interesting timeout management. Griffin: A-; Adrian was an unsung hero in the first half as he locked up Kirilenko and threw away the key. Kirilenko broke out in the second half and things were looking quite grim when Adrian left the game after straining his hamstring. Adrian finished up with 7 points and 6 rebounds to go with 2 steals and 1 assist. Zero turnovers. +10 Nowitzki: A+; Dirk just missed his 24th double-double tonight with a game high 34 points (14-25 FG, 4-6 treys, 2-4 FT), a Mavs high 9 rebounds, and a Mavs high 5 assists. Dirk helped key the Mavs 10-0 run in the fourth quarter to help seal this game. +36 Diop: C-; DeSagana struggled with reaching tonight and paid the price with 5 fouls in 10 minutes. DeSagana had only one rebound for the night. +0 Terry: B; Jason has been really jet-setting around the country trying to deal with the unexpected death of his 9 year old niece. Jason arrived for the game at 5:30 pm local time and still managed to come out and provide 14 points (6-13 FG, 2-6 treys). +10 Harris: A; Devin was looking really good tonight but got bumped hard and had to leave the game due to his sore quadriceps. The tough news is that the only thing that will fix this problem is rest. Devin had 4 points, both drives to the rim, to go with 1 assist before going to the locker room for treatment. Zero turnovers. +4 Stackhouse: B+; Jerry came out hot off the bench and kept it going with 16 points (5-11 FG, 0-2 treys, 6-8 FT) to go with 3 rebounds and 3 assists. +13 Daniels: B+; Marquis looking for an opportunity to shine made the most of his 33 minutes tonight with 12 points (4-8 FG, 4-7 FT) to go with 7 rebounds, 2 assists, and 2 steals. Zero turnovers. +16 Dampier: A; Erick again brought tons of energy off the bench on his way to 8 rebounds and 4 blocked shots. +11 Armstrong : C-; Darrell got 12 minutes tonight with Devin hurt but was rather ineffective. Darrell nearly lost it when he got called for a charging foul when he got sandwiched on a screen. -1 M?Benga: B; DJ got some real playing time tonight with Diop being so ineffective. DJ nailed his only shot and got a nice blocked shot in 6 minutes. +2 Powell: DNP-CD. Marshall : DNP-CD. Howard: DNP-CD, Inactive. Josh stepped on Brezec?s foot in the second period of the Bobcat game and re-aggravated his hamstring that was sore from a bad dunk landing in San Antonio. Josh had a good practice yesterday and participated in the pre-game shoot around, but as Avery had said earlier, Josh was a game time decision and the decision was to sit. Van Horn: DNP-CD, Inactive. Keith will be out with a strained MCL for at least 2 weeks sustained when Darrell Armstrong was pushed into him in the Bobcat game. Podkolzin: DNP-CD, Inactive. Pavel has been sent to the Fort Worth Flyers for playing time. Typical Chef Ed Type
