Stack’s 3 at buzzer caps comeback

LOS ANGELES – The Mavericks made coming back a habit Saturday night, so when Jerry Stackhouse lined up a 3-pointer with the buzzer about to sound, it seemed fitting. The ball found the bottom of the net and the Mavs found themselves wildly celebrating a dramatic 95-94 victory over the shell-shocked Los Angeles Clippers at Staples Center.

The Mavs battled back from deficits of 11 in the first half, 14 in the third quarter and nine in the last five minutes on the second half of a back-to-back. And they did it without Josh Howard, the team’s best defender and second-leading scorer who was excused to attend to a personal matter.

“There were a lot of points in the game where we could have said, ‘Screw it, it’s not our night,’” Jerry Stackhouse said after his second buzzer beater with the Mavs. He knocked one down at Boston almost exactly two years ago.

The deciding bucket followed an unlikely set of circumstances. After an Erick Dampier dunk and Dirk Nowitzki jumper tied it at 92, the Mavs made another stop. Nowitzki tried to get off a go-ahead shot, but was forced to pass.

Devin Harris missed a baseline jumper and Brandon Bass fouled Clippers guard Brevin Knight on the rebound. Knight hit two free throws with 28.1 seconds left. To make matters worse, Jason Terry fumbled a routine inbounds pass from Eddie Jones at halfcourt, giving LA the ball back with 27.5 seconds.

“I was mad at myself for about two seconds and I realized we had 28 seconds left in the game, which is a long time,” said Terry, who replaced Howard in the starting lineup and scored 20. “I knew we needed one stop.”