On Tuesday, Dallas activated Darrick Martin and placed Eduardo Najera on IR with a right knee contusion. Najera suffered the injury during Tuesday's practice. Martin, Adrian Griffin, and Greg Buckner all participated in Monday's and Tuesday's practices and may play in tonight's game. Philadelphia at Dallas (November 10) Dallas started ice cold and Philadelphia shot out to a 25-10 lead with 2:39 left as Dallas shot 7-21 FG. Philadelphia lead 26-17 after 1. As the saying goes, if you are going to be down big, best be down big early. Dallas opened the 2nd quarter with a 15-4 run to pull within 32-33 with 6:51 remaining on a 3-pointer by Dirk Nowitzki. Juwan Howard had 7 rebounds including 4 offensive during that run. Philly was able to hang on to the lead. Philadephia closed the quarter with a 7-2 run capped by a 3-pointer by Matt Harpring to go up 52-43 at the half. Philadelphia led 65-54 with 6 minutes to go and Dallas scored the next 7 points to pull within 61-65 with 3:43 remaining. Philly held a single-digit lead the rest of the quarter. A 3-pointer by Nowitzki ended the quarter. Philadelphia led 71-68 after 3. But Aaron McKie opened the 4th quarter with a counter 3-pointer. The teams traded points and Philly's lead fluctuated between 4 and 7 points. Philadelphia put consecutive baskets together and led 86-78 with 6 minutes left. Nowitzki was fouled shooting a 3-pointer and made all 3 free throws, but McKie answered with a 3-pointer. Michael Finley hit a 3-pointer, but Allen Iverson nailed a jumper, both teams missed on 2 possessions, and Dikembe Mutombo got a layup to give Philadelphia a 93-84 lead with 3 minutes to go. Philly answered every point Dallas scored the rest of the way (besides a meaningless dunk by Howard with 7 seconds left). Philadelphia won 98-91. When you get out-rebounded 54-38 including 17-9 offensive and only shooting 38% FG (including 13-39 FG from your 2 stars), you are going to lose almost every time - the opponent would have to put up a terrible performance not to win. The Mavs did not play bad defense in the 4th quarter, but did a terrible job of keeping Philadelphia off the boards as 6 of Philly's 12 4th quarter rebounds were offensive. Rebound, rebound, rebound. The team's got to learn. Dallas has shown that you can win without rebounding, but you can't win when lacking both rebounding and shooting. There were 3 Mavs throwing up bricks all night long. Michael Finley had 14 points including 5-21 FG. Dirk Nowitzki, playing all 48 minutes, had 25 points on 5-18 FG (only 2-11 2-point FGs) and 12-12 FT, but did have 10 rebounds. Tim Hardaway had 7 points (the _only_ bench points - but Shawn Bradley played just 11 minutes and Eduardo Najera just 2 minutes) including 2-11 FG and 1-6 3-pointers in 28 minutes. Yuch. The game spoiled Juwan Howard's first good shooting game at the new arena. Howard had 20 points including 9-10 FG and 10 rebounds - but 7 of them came in a 6 minute period in the 2nd quarter. Also spoiled was a strong performance by Steve Nash. Nash had 22 points and 10 assists while guarding the ever quick Allen Iverson. Danny Manning was quiet and not as effective as usual. He had 3 points including 1-5 FG and 5 rebounds. Philadelphia welcomed back their MVP with their first win of the season. Allen Iverson, playing in his first game of the season, had 18 points including 7-28 FG and 9 assists. Nash mostly single-covered him, with occasional help - the Mavs got burned (either by points or rebounds) by open big men when playing a trapping defense. A good sign of Dallas' problems in this game was Matt Harpring collecting 11 rebounds to go with his 13 points. Derrick Coleman led the way with 24 points including 10-16 FG, 13 rebounds including 7 offensive, and 6 assists. Dikembe Mutombo was the high rebounder with 17 boards and had 17 points. Aaron McKie was the sharp shooter with 19 points mostly (all?) from the outside. Philly also didn't get much from their bench with just 7 points from Corie Blount. They also played a short rotation as Raja Bell (13 minutes), Vonteego Cummings (6 minutes), and Blount (15 minutes) were the only bench players. Give Philly full credit for taking advantage of everything Dallas gave them (and they gave a lot) and exploiting Dallas' trapping defense. The Mavs have to work on rebounding, pray that Finley and Nowitzki are never that cold together again, and put this loss behind them. Even though Dallas has a good record at 5-2, I'm still waiting for this team to perform well in a game. They've gotten by with non-stellar performances by beating poor or injured teams (with the Charlotte win being the one exception). Quotes Don Nelson: "I thought our effort was good. To have Iverson come back was good for our team, but was also good for their team. Steve Nash had a terrific game offensively and defensively. Unfortunately, I didn't have enough guys who played well. We didn't shoot the ball very well. I credit their defense to that. They have always been a fine defensive team. I think we had some problems with Mike's shoulder. He couldn't get his shot to go down." [Finley was playing with a strained shoulder - he said that it did not affect his shooting.] Nelson on the rebounding difference: "That wasn't the only thing that cost us the game, but it was a part of it. When you shoot 38% and they shoot 48%, and you take a licking on the boards, they are going to get more shots to cost you the game. I thought we were going to win this game all along, up until the end when it got kind of lopsided. We just never made enough shots to do what we needed to do. Mike was off and when Mike and Dirk are struggling to score, we are in for a long night." Nelson: "Congratulations to Philadelphia. They were terrific tonight. Whatever we tried to do, they countered. We gave everything we had, both players and coaches. They basically wouldn't let us win tonight." Nelson: We've had too much fool's gold early in the season. We've got a lot of wins, but we don't really deserve the record we've got." Dirk Nowitzki: "They were getting all the loose balls bouncing around, and that was a big key why we lost the game. I guess they were just a little bit more aggressive than we were on the boards." Nowitzki: "We got close a couple of times in the 3rd quarter, but we weren't able to get the lead. They got too many offensive rebounds and every time we would cut the lead to 3 or 2 then McKie would hit a big jumper. I guess it wasn't meant to be tonight." Nowitzki: "I don't know if it was Iverson that gave them the lift, but the other guys beat us. Steve did a great defensive job on him. He was all over him and made him shoot some tough shots." Nowitzki on Dallas' poor shooting: "We had great looks. The same shots on most days go down. It seems like nothing was falling for us." Steve Nash: "We came out flat and didn't shoot the ball great, but you can win games when you don't shoot the ball well, but we got out-rebounded by a big margin and that really killed us." Nash: "They crashed the boards hard. Sometimes they out-hustled us, but sometimes they got a lot of lucky breaks. I give them all credit and their offensive rebounding really hurt us." Nash: "You can still win games when you don't shoot well, but we got killed on the boards. They out-pounced us." Nash on defending Iverson: "It's a lot of work, a lot of energy. Great players exploit any openings, so you have to just stay on him the whole time. He's a tremendous player." Nash: "We have to get better. We're not playing very well right now. We've got to get it all together. We have to be better defensively and on the boards and hopefully our offensive will continue to grow and find ways to be effective even when we're not shooting the ball great." Tim Hardaway: "I had some great looks tonight, Dirk and Mike, and everybody had some great looks, but unfortunately we couldn't put them down. They came down and capitalized on our missed shots and they had a lot of offensive rebounds that they put back in and that got us down by 10, 12 points." Danny Manning: "We can't make excuses. We just didn't get it done, and that's the bottom line. We all have our responsibilities and tonight we didn't do enough of those to put us in a position to win the game. If we rebound the ball better, shoot a little better, it's a different game. But that's a bunch of ifs." Larry Brown on Iverson: "He played great. He has no shot yet because he can't hardly straighten his arm yet, but he had 9 assists, 4 defensive rebounds, and he is a threat to score which opens it up for everybody else. And to play as many minutes as he played without a lot of practice time is incredible - both him and Aaron." Brown: "Coleman was a monster - he and Dikembe came up so big. They rebounded, they defended. We were really solid. Harpring did a phenomenal job on Finley, so did Aaron. We did a better job on Nowitzki than we have in the past." Brown: "Nash was phenomenal. I thought Nash defended Allen as well as anybody could and he controlled the game for Dallas. We beat a great team. This is a team that when they get Griffin back and get a little healthier, Buckner back, I think that they are going to be phenomenal. Danny and Hardaway are going to add some veteran leadership. They are very hard to play against. This is our best game by far. There is no way we win this game unless Aaron and Allen are out there and our big guys play that well." Allen Iverson: "Once I'm out there, my guys were able to do some things. [Coleman] had a great game. So did Aaron as well as the other guys. So I felt good coming back and being able to contribute. I didn't really care about my overall game. I just wanted to help get a win." Iverson: "I think I played well. This is my first chance to run up and down the court beside a few times in practice. My shot was not there because my legs were not there. I don't believe it was because of my elbow. It was because of my legs. My legs were not in it. They were not as strong as I would like them to be. Plus my elbow is not as strong as I want it to be. But I am getting there." Iverson: "I got kind of winded in the 1st quarter. I don't remember the last time I was that tired in the 1st quarter. I didn't expect that." Aaron McKie: "Allen freed me up. I didn't have to do all that one-on-one stuff. I let him do it, and just played off him. He could not practice for a month and play like that. I'm not one of those guys - I need the preparation. But this team is going to go as Allen goes, with everybody else filling in, doing their part. He's going to cause a commotion." McKie: "I was kind of scared for awhile. Because you don't expect those guys to continue to miss shots. They were not making their shots, but that's the nature of this game. You will have nights that you are not making your shots. But you will have to find other ways to win. We tried to do it on the defensive end. We tried to get it off the glass and create some easy baskets." Philadelphia 76ers 98, Dallas Mavericks 91 at Dallas (November 10) 1st 2nd 3rd 4th - Final 2FG 3FG FG% FT% Philadelphia 29 23 19 27 - 98 .481 .300 .461 .765 Dallas 17 26 25 23 - 91 .397 .333 .380 .923 Halftime: Philadelphia 52-43 3rd Q: Philadelphia 71-68 Technicals: Philadelphia defensive 3 seconds 11:18 3rd, Philadelphia defensive 3 seconds 3:48 3rd, Allen Iverson 1:08 4th Refs: Ronnie Nunn, Tony Brothers, Gary Zielinski Attendance: 19,857 (sellout) Did not play due to injury: Speedy Claxton (back spasms), Greg Buckner (sprained ankle), Adrian Griffin (back spasms) Philadelphia 76ers REB Player MIN FGM-FGA 3PM-3PA FTM-FTA PTS O-T AST TO PF STL BLK Matt Harpring 38 6-11 1-3 0-0 13 5-11 3 2 1 4 0 Derrick Coleman 39 10-16 0-0 4-4 24 7-13 6 0 1 0 2 Dikembe Mutombo 42 7-15 0-0 3-4 17 5-17 1 2 4 0 1 Allen Iverson 44 7-28 0-2 4-5 18 0-4 9 2 3 2 0 Aaron McKie 43 8-13 2-4 1-2 19 0-5 4 4 2 2 0 Raja Bell 13 0-2 0-1 0-0 0 0-0 0 2 4 0 0 Corie Blount 15 3-3 0-0 1-2 7 0-2 0 1 2 2 0 Vonteego Cummings 6 0-1 0-0 0-0 0 0-2 1 0 0 0 0 Totals 48 41-89 3-10 13-17 98 17-54 24 13 17 10 3 Dallas Mavericks REB Player MIN FGM-FGA 3PM-3PA FTM-FTA PTS O-T AST TO PF STL BLK Juwan Howard 40 9-10 0-0 2-2 20 4-10 2 2 5 3 0 Danny Manning 20 1-5 0-0 1-2 3 0-5 1 2 3 0 1 Dirk Nowitzki 48 5-18 3-7 12-12 25 1-10 1 2 2 0 2 Michael Finley 46 5-21 1-4 3-4 14 1-6 4 3 1 1 1 Steve Nash 45 8-13 2-4 4-4 22 2-3 10 3 2 2 0 Tim Hardaway 28 2-11 1-6 2-2 7 0-3 3 1 2 3 0 Shawn Bradley 11 0-1 0-0 0-0 0 1-1 0 0 0 0 1 Eduardo Najera 2 0-0 0-0 0-0 0 0-0 0 0 0 0 0 Totals 48 30-79 7-21 24-26 91 9-38 21 13 15 9 5 patricia