For much of this postseason, the Dallas Mavericks have been the NBA’s comeback kids. No lead has seemed too large for the Mavs to overcome in their pursuit of an NBA championship.

But as a veteran of the NBA game, Jason Kidd understood that there would come a time when playing from behind wouldn’t come so easy. He even foreshadowed such an instance in a shootaround media session just hours before Game 3 of the NBA Finals with the Miami Heat.

"We can’t get down against a team like this and think we’re going to always come back and win," Jason said. "They’re too good."


Jason would love to see the Mavs start out in front in Game 4, rather than playing from behind again.

Sure enough, in the second quarter of Game 2, the Mavs found themselves down again by double digits, trailing Miami by 14. With a rally, Dallas cut their deficit to five by halftime and remained in the game for the duration. But a try for the tie at the buzzer by Dirk Nowitzki wouldn’t fall and the Mavs dropped Game 3. Jason said the loss was as much a consequence of the early hole, as it was late game execution.

"We have to figure out how to get in front and play from up front," J-Kidd said. "I think we’ve been playing behind since Game 3 in Oklahoma, so this isn’t anything new."

For the Mavericks to do so in Game 4 tonight, Jason is again putting the weight on his own shoulders to make sure the offense runs as smoothly as possible against Miami.

"I would love to score 20 points, but I’ve got guys who can put the ball in the basket," he said. "I got to do a better job of putting my teammates in a position to be successful. I think that’s the one thing from here on out I’m going to try to do."

In the Heat, the Mavericks have been faced with the toughest defense they’ve seen all postseason. Miami has limited the Mavs to just 42 percent shooting from the field, more than five percent lower than their postseason average.

"You have to give them credit. If you see a window, they close it extremely fast," J-Kidd said. "We have to understand that. We have to take better care of the ball."

Zach Lowe of SI.com suggests that the Mavs can open up some more windows by using pass fakes and drawing on Jason’s ability to anticipate the next move:

Jason Kidd is really good at this, especially when he has room to survey the floor from the top of the three-point arc. Think of it like skipping the middleman: When Kidd is able to read how the defense is moving, he can figure out which guy is about to come open and pass to that player instead of passing to the guy who is already open. Kidd has fired a few no-look dishes of this sort already, mostly to Shawn Marion or a big guy (Tyson Chandler or Brendan Haywood) along the baseline. Haywood’s ability to read this action, catch the ball and go up strong is key here, and something third-string center Ian Mahinmi doesn’t quite have.

Haywood, who missed Game 3 with a hip injury, is a game-time decision for Game 4. J-Kidd said the Mavs missed him on Sunday night.

"We always miss Haywood. He’s a guy that changes shots and rebounds, and also can score on offensive end."

But when it comes down to it, No. 2 knows there is no time for excuses. He said that he was actually pleased with the looks the Mavs got in Game 3, for the most part. But the next step in the process is converting.

"We have to make baskets," he said. "We had some great looks that didn’t go down for us, especially late in the game. So we have to continue to take those wide-open looks, and hopefully in Game 4 they go down for us."

SO LONG, SHAQ
Along with Game 3 of the Finals, the weekend in the NBA brought an end to the career of one the league’s greats, Shaquille O’Neal.

Jason has been around the game for most of Shaq’s career, but No. 2’s memory of Shaq goes all the way back to his high-school days when Shaq made his first impression on the basketball world. J-Kidd was just 16 at the time, but remembers it well.

"My best memory is the McDonald’s All-America Game, when he went coast to coast," Kidd said. "He let us know right then that he was going to change the game. And he did."

NO QUIT IN MAVS
In his career, O’Neal lifted four NBA championships. This season, J-Kidd and Dirk Nowitzki seek to raise their first.

According to the New York Times, using a metric called Win Shares (WS), which measures a player’s all around contributions to a team, both Jason and Dirk rank among the best of all-time never to have won a championship.

"Leading the way is the Mavericks’ Nowitzki with 161 career WS, a mark that ranks 4th among active players and 17th in league history. Every active player who surrounds the 7-foot German on the Win Shares leader board — Shaquille O’Neal, Kevin Garnett, Tim Duncan, Kobe Bryant and Ray Allen — has won a championship, and Nowitzki knows his legacy will ultimately be measured against that standard as well.

He is far from alone in that predicament. Statistically, Kidd’s 130 WS makes him the fifth most accomplished point guard, behind John Stockton, Oscar Robertson, Magic Johnson and Gary Payton. Of those, though, only Stockton failed to win a championship, and it has doubtless hurt his perception among the hoops cognoscenti."

Their desire to win an NBA title has united Jason and Dirk as leaders of the Mavericks. J-Kidd has long been a leader in the league, guiding three different teams deep into the postseason. But even No. 2 has been impressed with Nowitzki’s leadership thus far on and off the floor, as he told HOOPSWORLD.

"I think it’s great," says Kidd, who is also a quiet leader by nature. "In this game you’re never too old to learn and grow and I think he’s done that by speaking up and talking. He’s not a guy who’s going to say a lot, but when he does say something everybody listens and take it to heart. In that aspect he’s grown in a big way. Also, I think his game has improved in terms of understanding the situation, being able to make the right pass, sharing the ball, and also playing defense. He’s grown in that area, too."

And as Jennifer Floyd Engel of the Fort Worth Star Telegram writes, neither is letting the Mavs give up on their dreams despite their 2-1 deficit entering Game 4:

The Basketball World has reverted back to giving the Mavs no shot at winning this NBA Finals after Game 3.

History backs this up, like zero percent chance or some such.

And just in case any stragglers persist in believing Dallas has a shot, a reporter basically told Mavs guard Jason Kidd as much during media time on Monday.

Reporter: "When they keep opening these double-digit leads repeatedly and kind of easily how does doubt not creep in a little bit, like ‘Maybe, these guys are just too good for us.’"

JKidd: "We’re just too stubborn."

Not to be deterred by JKidd’s unwillingness to concede Miami superiority, another question came along this same line.

Reporter: "Does this feel at all like when you’re playing in The Finals against Kobe and Shaq, and that team was just better than you? Does this Miami team feel like they have that much advantage?"

JKidd: "They were super good."

At this point, the reporter gave up because obviously JKidd was not willing to give Miami rings and verbal hugs.

GAME TIME
The Mavs have the opportunity to turn the NBA Finals into a best of three. A win tonight would knot the series at two while a defeat would force Dallas to win out in order to secure the NBA crown.

Jason is well aware of the magnitude of Game 4.

"We have to be prepared mentally and physically come tomorrow night and protect home," he said after practice on Monday. "We’ve gotta take one game at a time, and tomorrow we have to be focused and ready to go.

"This is our chance to tie it up," No. 2 added. "We definitely can’t go down 3-1."

Game 4 of the NBA Finals is set for a 8 p.m. CST tip-off and can be seen nationwide on ABC.

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