Recap: Mavericks 100 at Pistons 86

Earl K. Sneed recaps the defending champion Mavericks' first road win of the season as the team ended a three-game skid away from Dallas Tuesday night in Detroit against the lowly Pistons.

AUBURN HILLS, Mich. -- It’s not the White House, but the Palace of Auburn Hills would have to do if the Dallas Mavericks hoped to end their three-game road skid to begin the season.

Looking for their first win away from Dallas and trying to reach .500 for the first time this season, the defending champions took to the Detroit Pistons’ hardwood Tuesday night hoping not to have a loll after meeting President Barack Obama the day before. And with the Pistons already on a four-game losing streak, the Mavs hoped to see a wounded opponent as they tried to end their own winless streak outside of the friendly confines of the American Airlines Center.

Even without point guard Jason Kidd for a second straight game due to his lower back injury, the Mavs looked to return to the same form away from home as last season’s squad which finished with the NBA’s best road record. The team also began the night looking to start a back-to-back in victorious fashion.

“We’ve got to play well,” Mavericks coach Rick Carlisle said entering the matchup. “We’ve got to continue to work at playing better basketball, and each game we’ve shown some signs of improvement. The consistency of putting it together and keeping it together is where the priority is for us right now. That’s what we’re looking at. Detroit’s a desperate team that’s been depleted with some injury stuff and they’re gonna come at us very hard, and so we’re gonna have to be ready.”

The coach had no doubt that his team was ready by night’s end after the Mavericks (5-5) cruised to their first victory away from Big D with a runaway 100-86 win.

“We would love to be 10-0 right now,” new addition Delonte West said after the Mavs moved to even on the season. “It’s a long season and you can’t get too high or too low on wins and losses until the losses start to hurt you once you get in the playoffs.”

Showing that they were indeed ready to play from the opening tipoff, the Mavericks jumped out to an early advantage behind center Brendan Haywood’s play inside at the offensive end. And very quickly the Mavs found themselves up by double digits after another North Carolina product, Vince Carter, swished in a 3-pointer off West’s dribble penetration.

“He’s incredible,” Terry said of West’s performance. “His energy we’ve been feeding off of it, obviously without J-Kidd. I think that people forget about Delonte’s ability to run the team and play point guard. That’s what he was drafted as and he’s a good one.”

West would continue to man the control in place of Kidd at the point, finding forward Shawn Marion at the cup to give the Mavs a 19-4 run to open play. But playing in front their home crowd the Pistons (2-8) would fight back to within six, before the Mavs exited the first period with a 30-20 advantage.

Playing a combination of starters and reserves, Carlisle got an early lift from a lineup of Terry, Carter, Lamar Odom, Dirk Nowitzki and Ian Mahinmi in the early stage of the second stanza. With Carter raining in his third 3-pointer of the first half and Nowitzki draining multiple midrange jumpers, the Mavs began to create a separation on the scoreboard.

The margin would reach as much as 18, before Nowitzki’s perfect 6-for-6 shooting and 12 points powered the Mavericks to a 52-38 lead at the halftime break.

“I definitely had a good rhythm at the beginning … after seeing the first couple go in,” Nowitzki modestly said.

“Dirk developed a rhythm. He had his stroke going and we needed it,” Terry added.

Bouncing back from a combined 5-of-22 shooting in the previous two games, Nowitzki led the way with a flawless first half. Meanwhile, the Mavericks outshot the Pistons through 24 minutes of play, 61.3 percent to 39.4 percent, in addition to a 17-8 rebounding advantage.

The third quarter began with West and Marion leading the defensive charge for the Mavericks and turning stops into scores.

“Tonight, we were on their heels,” Marion said. “We were just trying to make it hard for them.”

Nowitzki then rejoined the act with an empathic slam in the midst of a 16-0 run as the lead ballooned to 28. Meanwhile, West continued to dish out the assists a la Kidd, while also patrolling the perimeter on the defensive end for steals. And with three quarters in the books, the Mavs emerged with a 76-55 lead.

Choosing to rest his starters in the game’s final period, Carlisle had nothing to worry about when he handed matters over to the reserves after backup big man Brandan Wright’s thunderous lefty slam on an alley-oop feed from Terry. The team never looked back the rest of the way en route to a blowout road win, with recently called up forward Yi Jianlian seeing his first action as a Maverick down the stretch.

“Obviously last year we were a great road team — never afraid to walk into any building, always capable of winning on the road. That’s what good teams do. … Hopefully we can get back to being a great road team,” Nowitzki said.

Finishing the night 9-for-10, Nowitzki led the way with 18 points and seven rebounds. Also in the first unit, Marion pitched in 14 points and Carter added 11 points, with West filling up the stat sheet with six points, a season-high 10 assists and five steals.

“It’s not often you have a guy on the floor that goes 9-for-10, but there’s a guy on the floor that’s actually the best player on the court. Delonte was the best player on the court because of his competiveness. That’s what we need right now. We need consistency as a team competitively and he set a great tone for us the last two games,” Carlisle said while praising West’s night.

“Definitely a good game for us offensively,” Nowitzki added. “I thought we started off well. Defensively, I think Delonte set a great tone for us, getting steals, being in the passing lanes, being active and that really rubbed over on everybody.”

Off the Dallas bench, Mahinmi contributed 10 points. Meanwhile, the Mavs turned 21 Detroit turnovers into 29 points at the other end, with the Pistons only forcing 14 Dallas giveaways for 10 points in comparison.

Reserve guard Will Bynum led three Pistons in double figures with 20 points on 7-for-14 shooting. But the Mavs finished the night outshooting the Pistons, 55.1 percent to 43.5 percent, adding a 35-29 rebounding edge to boot.

The Mavs return to action looking to sweep their road trip and hoping to extend their back-to-back wins to three straight Wednesday night in Boston, in a game against the Eastern Conference power Celtics. The Celtics will be on four days rest entering the nationally-televised matchup.

“That’s one thing you have to take advantage of this season, teams that are coming off of back-to-backs. You see across the league that those back-to-back-to-back games are wearing on teams. That’s what we did, we just took advantage. For us, we’re going in there tomorrow against a team that’s going to try and jump on us tomorrow, so it’s already forward thinking,” the ex-Celtic West said.

“It’s a road win that we haven’t had yet, so that’s really important to us,” Carlisle said while looking ahead. “Momentum has been illusive for us, so we respect how tough it is competitively in this league right now. But our goal is to build on this.”

Note: The Mavs-Celtics matchup will air Wednesday night locally on Fox Sports Southwest and nationally on ESPN at 7 p.m. CT.

After battling the Celtics, the Mavs return home to face off with the Milwaukee Bucks next Friday night in a game that will air locally on Fox Sports Southwest at 7:30 p.m. CT. Tickets are still available and can be purchased by calling (214) 747-6287.

Single-game tickets are on sale and available at the American Airlines Center North Box Office, online at mavs.com, via phone by calling 214-747-MAVS or 1-800-4NBA-TIX and all Ticketmaster outlets (Fiesta Grocery Stores, Wal-Mart, Simon Mall in Garland and the Shops at Willow Bend in Plano).

Dr. Pepper Family Nights are here! Plans include four Mavs tickets and four McDonald’s extra value meals, starting at $49. Visit mavs.com or call 214-747-MAVS for a schedule of games and to purchase tickets.