Unlikely hero Brussino shines as the Mavs make red-hot Wizards disappear

That line for receiving game balls after the Dallas Mavericks upset the Washington Wizards on Wednesday night turned out to be very long.

But at the head of that line is undoubtedly rookie forward Nicolas Brussino.

Called upon during a difficult time, Brussino came off the bench to score a career-high 11 points, grabbed a career-high nine rebounds and also manufactured two steals as the Mavs rallied from a 12-point second-half deficit to upend the red-hot Wizards, 112-107, before 17,844 at the Verizon Center.

With Brussino shining, the Mavs (29-38) snapped a two-game losing streak and captured their first road victory since they won at Portland on Feb. 3 – seven road games ago. And it was an improbable win at best for the Mavs, who made things a bit antsy near the end when they missed four free throws in the final 21.6 seconds.

Because Wesley Matthews sat out with a strained right calf, coach Rick Carlisle was desperate to put a warm body on the floor who he thought could contribute. Enter Brussino, a product of Argentina who has barely played this season.

“Well, look at our roster,” Carlisle said. “There is nobody really else to play unless we’re going to throw the 10-day [contract] guys in there.”

A steal and a 3-pointer by Seth Curry, and another steal by Curry that led to a bucket By Dirk Nowitzki gave the Mavs their first lead of the night, 89-87, with 7:25 remaining in the game. From there, Brussino flat-out took over the game.

Brussino started with back-to-back 3-pointers, and later scored on a put-back following a Nowitzki missed shot which put the Mavs ahead 99-90 with 3:04 to go in the game.

Through assistant coach Kaleb Canales – an interpreter, Brussino said: “I think I had a great game. He’s just in the process and this for him is the process of every day working for the coaching staff, with the players, with his teammates.

“He’s really happy because his teammates believe in him so much and he was glad that he could put out a good game for his teammates tonight.”

Center Nerlens Noel also put out a good game for the Mavs, who fell behind 39-32 after the first quarter and 57-53 at intermission. Noel tossed in 12 points – he had a nasty offensive rebound dunk in the fourth quarter – after sitting out the previous three games with a sore left knee.

Noel even stepped up to the free throw line and buried a pair of charity tosses to account for the game’s final two points with 1.7 seconds left.

“I’m still in pretty shape with the workout I got over the past few days,” Noel said. “So I just wanted to go out there and make a difference and impact the game.”

Curry, meanwhile, bounced back after a pair of subpar games that saw him score a total of eight points on 3-of-16 shooting during losses to Phoenix and Toronto. Curry finished the night with 19 points on 6-of-10 shots and also converted 3-of-7 baskets from 3-point territory.

“It felt good to get one go to,” Curry said. “I just tried to stick with the process, tried to keep getting good shots and not force it too much.

“My teammates knew I was struggling the past two games, so they found me in good spots and tried to get me going a little bit.”

The Mavs trailed 74-62 with 3:59 left in the third quarter, but kicked into high gear and wound up outscoring Washington 39-27 in the fourth quarter. The Wizards, who lead the Southeast Division, fall to 41-26, still third in the Eastern Conference.

“Well we desperately needed this game after what transpired over the last two games to get ourselves back in the mix, so our guys knew it,” Carlisle said. “Our guys showed a lot of resilience tonight.”

This story was originally published March 15, 2017 at 10:55 PM with the headline "Unlikely hero Brussino shines as the Mavs make red-hot Wizards disappear."