Wednesday, November 21, 2007

Harris becomes the offense

Devin Harris and Avery Johnson have that point-guard bond. Each is in tune with what the other wants to do.

Well, most of the time.

“Sometimes he calls play calls and I have no idea what he wants,” Harris joked Wednesday night before the Mavericks faced Houston at the Toyota Center.

Harris had a good idea the previous night. After the Raptors opened up a 24-point lead midway through the second quarter, Johnson decided to turn it over to Harris. Harris already has the reins to the offense. Johnson, though, wanted Harris to be the offense.

“That’s a trust factor,” Johnson said. “He wasn’t ready to do that in the past. I think all teams that want to finish their season with a win have point guards that they can just put the ball in their hands and ask them to make a play just by themselves.

“We feel he’s gotten to that point now. I trust him more now. We had a stretch there where we were pretty lethargic and we asked him to go in there and penetrate and don’t even pass the ball. Just score or get to the free throw line and make something happen because we’ve got to get something going. And he did.”

It didn’t matter who stood in Harris’ way, even the lightning-quick T.J. Ford, Harris was getting to the rim. He scored 11 of the Mavs’ 13 points during his Superman stretch, helping Dallas cut the deficit to a manageable 14 at the half.

“I could tell by his play calling what he wanted me to do,” Harris said.

Harris followed Johnson’s orders to a tee.

“Oh, yeah,” he said. “I do what I’m told.”

Even when he has no idea.

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