Clippers run over Mavericks, hand them their 7th straight loss

Another game came and went Wednesday night with the Dallas Mavericks leaving the court with more frowns on their faces.

And not even the return of Dirk Nowitzki could stop the bleeding.

Austin Rivers came off the bench to pour in 22 points and lead the highly touted Los Angeles Clippers to an easy 124-104 victory over the Mavs before a sellout crowd of 20,042 at American Airlines Center. The loss was the seventh straight for the Mavs, who are a dismal 2-12 and have the NBA’s worst record.

Until Wednesday, the last time the Mavs lost seven games in a row was Feb. 9-19, 1999 during Nowitzki’s rookie season.

Key injuries and the second-most difficult schedule during the first 15 games of the season have contributed mightily to the Mavs’ downfall. Still, they know they have to pick themselves up and have a better showing than they did against the Clippers when they turned the ball over 16 times and did a poor job finishing quarters.

“Finishing quarters is a very important part of winning games and staying in games against contending caliber teams and we didn’t do it,’’ coach Rick Carlisle said. “We have another top team — actually the NBA champions (Cleveland Cavaliers) in a couple of days — so these kinds of things we are going to have to do much better at.

“I am disappointed at the final outcome and disappointed at the way we ended those quarters. We are going to keep working hard and coaching the guys hard. As our health gets better we are going to have a chance to get better, but we are going to have to make it better, it is not just going to happen.’’

For now, Nowitzki knows why it’s not happening for the Mavs.

“If you look at last year we had probably the easiest schedule out of the whole league in the first month and we took advantage of it,’’ he said. “Then later on we fell in some holes.

“This year’s just the other way around with the tough schedule, a lot of games, a lot of road games. So hopefully we’ll fight through this and grind out a win here and there, and when the schedule turns in our favor hopefully get healthier and run off some wins. That’s the only way to do it.’’

The Mavs actually led 15-7 midway through the first quarter of Wednesday’s game, and then the roof caved in.　Rivers had nine points, including a pair of back-to-back 3-pointers — the latter one coming after a steal — during a 4.3-second span late in the first quarter.

From there, the Clippers kept stacking points, rising for spectacular dunks and increasing their record to an NBA-best 14-2.

The Clippers led 32-26 after the first quarter, 68-45 at the half and 78-47 early in the third quarter.

“I thought that at the beginning we had a good pace and a good flow to it,’’ Carlisle said. “We managed to get an eight point lead and then we had a bunch of ugly turnovers.

“A really catastrophic ending to the first quarter kind of set the tone for the second quarter and we had another bad ending to the second quarter. We lost the end of the first quarter 15 to 4 and the end of the second quarter 9 to 2.’’

Ultimately, the Mavs lost the game as the Clippers started to get whatever they wanted and whenever they wanted it. It turned out to be that kind of an ugly game for the Mavs.

“This is as tough of a week as you can get in the NBA with the Spurs (this past Monday), Clippers, and Cleveland coming up,’’ Nowitzki said. “We knew coming in that the schedule in November was going to be a beast with a lot of road games and a lot of traveling.

“It’s a good thing because at some point it is going to turn around for us with the schedule.’’

Harrison Barnes led the Mavs with 22 points on 10-of-19 shots, Wesley Matthews tallied 18 points, Justin Anderson scored 12, and Jonathan Gibson added 11.

The Mavs played without injured guards Deron Williams, Devin Harris and J.J. Barea. Meanwhile, Nowitzki, who missed eight straight games with a sore right Achilles, played 19 minutes and scored 10 points on 3-of-10 shooting.

“I thought he did well,” Carlisle said of Nowitzki. “He didn’t shoot the ball particularly well, but I think he moved well and he felt good afterwards so it was a positive step.’’

In analyzing his performance, Nowitzki said: “It was good to be out there again. My conditioning is lacking a little bit right now; I was a little tired out there but at least my body felt fine and that’s all that matters.”

This story was originally published November 23, 2016 at 11:38 PM with the headline "Clippers run over Mavericks, hand them their 7th straight loss."