What we know about the Mavericks this season

While the Mavericks are on the verge of adding front-line depth in the form of Amar’e Stoudemire, who reached a verbal agreement to join Dallas after agreeing to a buyout with the New York Knicks on Monday, the Mavs were were all over the map in terms of what they were able to accomplish in the 55 games prior to the All-Star break.

The Mavericks went 36-19, with half of their wins coming in 23 games against the weaker Eastern Conference. Dallas was 18-5 against the East, including 13-0 on the road.

But the Mavericks were just 18-14 against Western Conference foes, a record that must drastically improve as they kick off the final 27 games of the season Thursday night at Oklahoma City.

“We’re definitely getting better, but our record is good and our schedule is going to get much harder,” forward Chandler Parsons said. “So we have to bear down here, and [we’ve] got to clean up some things.

“Only 27 games left, so it’s getting down to the wire, going to be really close in the conference.”

Here are five things we have learned about the Mavericks at the break:

If the Mavericks want to be serious about winning their second NBA title in five seasons, they have to start beating some of the West’s best teams. As of now, the Mavericks are just 3-12 against the other seven teams from the West that would be in the postseason if it started today.

No team in the NBA has more road wins than the Mavericks’ 19. The ability to pile up so many victories away from home speaks to the Mavericks’ ability to block out everything and focus on the task at hand. It also speaks to their ability to zero in and tune out crowd noise.