Dallas Mavericks coach Rick Carlisle thoroughly understands NBA basketball in 2011. It's allowed him to guide a very unlikely group of different athletes at different times of their careers into the NBA Finals.
That was a clear message that came through in Carlisle's interview on Norm Hitzges show Thursday morning on KTCK/1310 AM The Ticket.
Carlisle, an old NBA guard, didn't take off his game face. Asked how he celebrated the Western Conference championship victory over Oklahoma City, Carlisle didn't hesitate: "Well, there nothing to celebrate yet."
Carlisle noted that he has been in the NBA Finals four times, three times as a player and once as an assistant coach (winning once, with the Celtics in 1986, losing with the Celtics in '85 and '87, and as an assistant with the Pacers in 2000), and second place, he said, means nothing.
So how did the Mavericks get this far? Among items Carlisle touched on with Hitzges:
"The soul of this team is healthy and intact." There is chemistry, there are no issues in the locker room, Carlisle said.
This team understands that everything is hard, and these Mavs like it that way, Carlisle said. Things are going to look bad at times, but if you understand that, you know how to adjust.
"The game now is a large part a scramble game. You have to have a scramble mentality. And you have to win the scrambles." Calling a play in the fourth quarter of a playoff game, that doesn't work, Carlisle said, given the defensive tenacity. Thus, the Mavericks have gone with the unconventional, as they did late against Oklahoma City, risking defensive rebounds for defensive stops by sending their bigs farther out on the floor.
"If there were more than one ball out there," the Mavericks might be in trouble. They don't put superstar athletes all over the court, but given one basketball, rather than having one-on-one matchups all over the court, rewards those playing team basketball.
Shawn Marion's contribution has been vastly underrated, and he may epitomize what these Mavericks are about. When Marion came to the Mavericks before last season, "he was new to us, we were new to him. ... He had to reinvent his game to some extent." The Mavs didn't know how his skills would fit into their style, Carlisle said. He's become a defensive stopper. And his offense has come to the fore. "If you look at the stats in his career, you'd be shocked at the company he's in," Carlisle said.</li>
-- Vince Langford
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