Mavericks, Stars take different roads

By David Mullen

In early May, the Dallas Mavericks and the Dallas Stars met at the preverbial fork in the road. As the playoffs were about to take shape in the NBA and NHL, the Mavericks took the high road, and the Stars took the low road, which led to an abrupt dead end. It was as if the Mavericks are heading right down Broadway, and the Stars took the Slauson cutoff.

The Mavs are the newest model right off the lot, shiny with that new team smell. They are running on all cylinders, just hoping to avoid a recall notice. 

The Stars, on the other hand, are a beat-up jalopy, where the owner must decide in the next few months whether to repair and replace the broken parts, polish it up and roll it out of the garage for one last run or trade it in for an all-new model. With their season over, they have already missed the big race.

After winning the Western Conference playoffs and making the Stanley Cup Finals in the truncated 2019-20 season, the Stars engine seized and finished fifth in the Central Division. There are so many reasons to consider, but basically, they were ill-equipped to bounce back after a brief stop to make a playoff run.

The Stars played their final game of 2019-20 on September 28 and were expected to return to practice for the 2020-21 season in late December. But COVID-19 reared its ugly head. During training camp, 17 Stars were forced to miss time because of positive tests, and the first three regular season games (in Miami and Tampa) were postponed. February’s winter storm delayed even more games, forcing the league to find room to wedge the make-up contests into an already tight schedule. 

Starting goalie Ben Bishop and center Tyler Sequin began the season recovering from surgery. Roope Hintz (groin), Joel Kiviranta and Alexander Radulov (both with the mysterious “lower body” injury) were often missing. 

Bishop never played all season and Sequin made three late season appearances. Goalie Anton Khudobin could not find his playoff magic from last season. The Stars lost a league high 14 games in overtime and shootouts and had a tough time scoring all season.

If there is a silver lining in a lost season, younger players got a chance to learn on big league ice. Players like winger Jason Robertson and backup goalie Jake Oettinger gave reason for optimism. But leading scorer Joe Pavelski turns 37 on Sunday, July 11, and Sequin and team captain Jamie Benn still seem young on paper but are aging in hockey years.

As the Mavericks still jockey for a final playoff berth, it appears that a favorable remaining schedule and the unstoppable young Luka Doncic will help them avoid play-in playoff games and get much needed rest. 

The Mavericks are like an Italian sports car. They can turn it up to a high rate of speed and look extremely good doing it but are only one unreliable part — power forward Kristaps Porziņģis — from being grounded. Without Porziņģis, the team must get a lot of miles out of Doncic.

The Mavs clinched the Southwest Division title, which does not mean anything anymore. The top eight teams in the Western Conference move on to the playoffs.

The Mavs are holding on to a precarious fifth place spot in the Western Conference. They cannot catch the four teams ahead of them, so they must concentrate on their rearview mirror to keep an eye on the Portland Trail Blazers and defending NBA champion Los Angeles Lakers. A fifth or sixth place finish guarantees that the Mavs avoid facing qualifying games.

 The road to the NBA playoffs is still under construction. The seventh team faces eighth in the play-in tournament with the winner grabbing the seventh seed. The loser then plays the winner of the game between the ninth and 10th team for the eighth seed in the conference playoffs. This cloverleaf system is more confusing than the Dallas Mixmaster.

Unlike the Stars, the Mavericks have plenty in the tank. Tim Hardaway Jr. may not be an All-Star like his father was, but he has recently averaged more than 25 PPG, and the Mavs win when he shoots more than 40 percent from three-point land. Dwight Powell keeps improving after a brutal Achilles injury and provides an inside presence. He rebounds, intimidates and makes his shots.

Jalen Brunson is young, only 6-foot-1, and has never played in a playoff game. But he helped Villanova win two NCAA championships in college and is scoring in double digits. Josh Richardson, Dorian Finney-Smith and Maxi Kleber play defense with aggression, and Finney-Smith is not shy about taking on the opposition’s best scorers. And there is a reason the Mavs acquire J.J. Redick at the trading deadline. If he is healthy, he provides senior leadership and is a valuable three-point option.

The Mavericks are in the fast lane. How far they travel in the playoffs remains to be seen. If history is any indicator, the Stars will hang on to the inner core of the team for one more run. They must hope that next season, there are fewer bumps in the road.  

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