Notebook: Turning it on ... the road

The Mavericks hit the road knowing it’s time to right a wrong. Not that losing away from home is out of the ordinary – only eight of 30 teams having winning records in enemy gyms – but the Mavs have grown accustomed to success outside of the friendly confines.

Dallas posted just one losing record on the road (2003-04) in the previous seven seasons. In Avery Johnson’s two full regular seasons as head coach, the Mavs were 26-15 and 31-10 away from American Airlines Center.

“We know we can play well at home, but the great teams find ways to win on the road,” Dirk Nowitzki said. “We’ve got to see if we can get that [road killer instinct] back that we had last year. We just had that confidence walking into other arenas knowing that we can pretty much win anywhere. We got to get back to playing well on the road.”

Despite having the third-best record in the Western Conference and starting Thursday virtually tied with San Antonio atop the Southwest Division, the Mavs (24-11) are just 7-8 on the road. Beginning with Friday night’s visit to Seattle, five of the next six games are at NBA outposts beyond North Texas.

“Really looking forward to it,” coach Avery Johnson said. “You can’t really play well overall on the road until you start with the first game. I’d like to see some carryover and getting that bunker mentality, and hopefully we can start doing it.”

Putting a finger on the sub-par results away from home can be traced to the team’s slow start. Six of the road losses occurred during those first 20 games of the season. Players were in and out of the lineup, Johnson was experimenting with rotations and the team just hadn’t gotten things together.

The Mavs are 12-3 since, including the current five-game winning streak. Dallas is 3-2 on the road in that span, with all three wins by double figures. None of three teams on this trip – Seattle, LA Clippers (Saturday) and Sacramento (Monday) – own a winning record.

“Fortunately for us, we’re starting to look like the Mavericks that I anticipated,” Johnson said. “If we can keep looking like that the Mavericks that we’ve been looking like here recently, then I think we can keep getting better.

“And I think that’s what we’re focusing on. We hadn’t really been talking about winning or losing that much, as much as we’ve been talking about getting better in all aspects of our game.”

The Sonics (9-26) may not appear to offer much of a challenge on paper with the second-worst record in the West, but the Mavs are just 11-4 against teams with losing records and there’s that road mark. Plus, Seattle employs Kevin Durant, the future Rookie of the Year.

“They’re young,” Johnson said. “Durant is one of the best young players to come in our game in a long time. They’re just athletic. Nick Collison is still a young player. Earl Watson is doing a nice job at the point. We’ve got to go up there and play one of our better games to have a chance to win.”

Closer to nine

Eddie Jones finding his rhythm has settled the starting lineup. The rotation stretches to a solid seven with Jason Terry and Jerry Stackhouse hitting their stride off the bench.

“We’d like to have a solid nine-man rotation,” Avery Johnson said.

That leaves two openings. Johnson said he’s getting a better feel for those spots with Brandon Bass, Gana Diop and Devean George being the prime options. Johnson added that Trenton Hassell and Juwan Howard aren’t out of the mix.

Having a nine-man rotation doesn’t mean using the same nine every night. Much will depend on matchups, the goals for that particular night or the flow of the game.

Bass and George, for example, allow for more frontline flexibility against smaller, quicker teams. George is also an asset against bigger, more physical swingmen. Diop provides size and shot-blocking ability.