Lessons from Golden State-Portland

The Mavs have taken a pair of two-game road trips this season, having gone 1-1 on each. They were in position to sweep both only to drop the second game.

On the latest jaunt to the West Coast, the Mavs downed Golden State in a spirited and emotional shootout before being handled by Portland.

“Any time you come off the road with a split, that’s not a bad deal,” Avery Johnson said. “We sure like to win all of them, but it would have been worse if we’d had come back 0-2.

“I think more than anything guys were really looking forward to that first game on the road probably since the season ended, and I don’t know if we left most of our emotions and concentration in that game, but we didn’t have anything against Portland.”