Game 1: Rockets at Mavericks

I' m not gonna lie to you, it felt great.

Dallas Mavericks. American Airlines Center. Home opener. I've been waiting for this day since April 29.

And there was lots to love, despite the loss. There was lots to improve on also. So let's take a look at what we learned.

The Good:

• Josh Howard - Simply a breathtaking performance in the first three quarters. Not only did he start 5-for-5, but he hustled his balls off, including a play when he outfought Yao, T-Mac and Artest for a rebound, his own rebound nonetheless. Not a bad way to come back after a long summer.
  
• The offense - No longer did it seem like three players on offense looked like they were confused. No longer did they run endless isos and live and die by the jump shot. Dirk, Josh Howard, even Kidd tried to penetrate, and got dividends.
  
• The Dirkster - Had a dynamite first half before going cold in the second. But he scored from three, he used his patented fade away, he got to the basket, and he got some boards.
  
• Jason Terry - Besides getting fired up at the beginning, and keeping the crowd fired up, he did a great job filling in for Kidd. It's nice to see players like him and Ginobili that will accept their role, as long as its whats best for the team.
  
• The smallball lineup - The lineup of Kidd, Terry, Jo-Ho, Bass, and Dirk could really do things. I wrote about that in my blog a few months ago that they should play with putting Dirk at the 5, and obviously Rick Carlisle is a fan of www.dirkismyhomeboy.blogspot.com. Not that I blame him

The Bad:

• Defense - Not that it's easy to control three All-Stars and potential Hall-of-famers, but they didn't do a great job of stopping the bleeding. Dampier did okay on Yao, but Diop might as well have been holding a red blanket, and just ole-iny Yao to the rack.
  
• Crunch time - A much publicized weakness of the Mavs of late has been their fourth quarter performance. Sometimes a breakout first quarter can put a team away for good, but not a playoff team like the Rockets. You can't expect to win Jo-Ho only gets one bucket, and Dirk only gets a technical free throw.
  
• The bench - Besides Jason Terry, the bench did zippy, except blow any lead the starters handed them. With a bench of young guys like Gerald Green and Diop, and vets like Stackhouse, they should be okay, but they didn't show it last night.
  
• Antoine Wright - After being pretty ineffective last year as a pawn in the Kidd trade, the rumors were that he had busted nuts during camp and the preseason, and earned himself a starter's job. Didn't look like it tonight. Besides shaky defense, a few airballs and some turnovers, his name wasn't called to much.
  

The Ugly:

Reggie Miller defending Ron Artest, and blatantly ignoring what was put in front of him. Look, I'm a big Artest fan, and I hate the negative publicity that outweighs his amazing skill at most areas of basketball.

But Artest clearly made first contact in that little skirmish between him, Yao and Howard.

If you didn't see it, here's what happened: Jo-Ho gave Yao a hard foul, which is a given in a close division game. Yao did the thing where he looks away from Howard, but walks into him shoulder first, which Howard did a good job by not responding.

Then Artest comes in and give Howard a shove, then he walks to usher Yao away from the whole group.

Do I think Artest should have been given a T? Probably not. But refs call by reputation in this league, for better or worse, and Artest did instigate contact.

What made me mad was that Reggie Miller kept insisting that, "Ron didn't do anything, he just came to help Yao get away."

Marv Albert was respectfully trying to point out how wrong Miller was, but he wouldn't listen to reason. Then, when the replays started pouring in, Miller stayed completely silent while Artest came in and shoved Howard, then as Artest went to Yao, Miller would scream, "See! He didn't do anything except help his teammate."

While I enjoyed the awkwardness of Marv trying to tell Reggie, "Look, you're wrong, and making yourself sound more ignorant by the second," in a professional way, Reggie Miller needs to shut his mouth, especially when confronted with the video.

For more coverage of the Dallas Mavericks, including more poignant insights on what's to come from this team, see my blog.