The Mavericks got a much-needed win on Friday night when they defeated the defending Eastern Conference champion Miami Heat 93-83 at the American Airlines Center. It was the latest example of this new NBA season just feeling about as odd and different as one possibly could from previous ones.

It’s not just a matter of the stands being empty besides a few staff employees or the different arrangement of the schedule, the game play is just flat out different. The early results around the league back that up. Looking up and down the standings on Friday morning, 16 of the league’s teams have just a record of 3-2, 3-3 or 2-3. A lot of just “meh” starts. The Denver Nuggets, a participant in last season’s Western Conference Finals, are just 1-4 after losing on Friday night to the team who has the best record in the league at 5-1: the Phoenix Suns.

Obviously things are going to change over the course of the long regular season, but it doesn’t really seem like that change will be coming soon. Friday night’s game between Miami and Dallas was the ultimate example of this. The Mavericks led by over 20 points for parts of the second half, but it honestly felt like they could be losing with their poor shot-making and strange turnovers.

Miami saw Dallas’ play and said, “Oh yeah? Watch this!” for basically the first 40 minutes of the game. Sharpshooters Duncan Robinson and Tyler Herro combined to go 2-12 from deep and Jimmy Butler appeared to come back way too soon from his lingering ankle injury going 0-6 from the field in 27 minutes. Before making the score look closer on the scoreboard down the stretch of the fourth quarter, the Heat barely even showed up for this game.

The Mavericks weren’t much better, honestly, shooting just 41% from the field. Luka Doncic did take a step forward in his perimeter shooting with making three three pointers on the night, albeit on ten attempts. As much as I’d like to credit the Mavs’ defense for their improved effort compared to Wednesday against the Hornets, it’s hard not to just be so bewildered by the Heat basically just sleepwalking through a regular season NBA game.

Ultimately, the feelings around this game don’t matter in the standings. The Mavericks just badly needed a win to avoid falling to 1-4 and they did what it took to get one.

---

Postgame quotes 
“We didn’t talk about offense the last couple of days. We’re just talking about defense, effort, intensity, playing together hard, and the importance of details.” – Rick Carlisle
Seeing the Heat shoot just 37% from the field after the Hornets managed to shoot 51% on Wednesday is certainly an improvement. 

“It helps when you have former players from those teams, and they are calling out the plays before they even happen  because they have been in those situations for years. Just them being out there on the floor, James [Johnson] being on the  bench talking and screaming plays out, and J. Rich [Josh Richardson] making sure we are alert out there on the floor helped  us out tremendously.” – Tim Hardaway Jr. on having former members of the Heat on this Mavs team.

“All of the games are tough. They are so quick. But I think we went through our tough stretch in the first three games  honestly. It really showed us where we were at and humbled us. We are locked in. We are ready to get to work and the guys  are always excited to come in.” – James Johnson on the upcoming road trip and what the team has been through in the first five games of the season.

---

The Mavericks will look to get back to .500 when they take on the Chicago Bulls (2-4) at the United Center on Sunday night at 7 PM.