Jason Kidd, sharpshooter, continues to make opponents pay at crunchtime.

No. 2 nailed a pair of threes in the fourth quarter Tuesday night, clinching a 122-117 Dallas victory over the Phoenix Suns. With the victory, the Mavs moved five games ahead of the Suns for the eightth playoff spot, and 14 games above .500 for the first time this season.

Now that the Mavs have basically locked up a playoff sport, they can start to look to improving their positioning, as they are only 2 games out of 4th place. Jason talked about this with the Star-Telegram:

“We know Phoenix is a team that’s behind us. Now, we’re the ones chasing. We’re looking up, not behind us. We want to get as high as we can.”

The victory over the Suns was the first road win for the Mavs over a Western Conference playoff contender since a Christmas victory over the Trail Blazers and the first road win in general since a victory over the Magic on February 2nd. It was accomplished by out-toughing the Suns as the Mavs out-rebounded them 46-36, including 8 from J-Kidd.

Jason talked with Mavs Moneyball about how big getting a road victory was:

“Well, it snaps the road losing streak—we hadn’t won since Orlando. We played against a team that’s chasing us so we came out. Everybody pitched in. Dirk was big for us but Ryan came in and gave us a spark there in the third.”

“I think we were just focusing on Phoenix and not worrying about anyone else. We knew that we’d been playing all right on the road but hadn’t gotten a win. This is a big road trip so we wanted to get it started off on the right foot.”

NAILING 3s
With the Suns making a run and Nowitzki being double-teamed every time he touched the ball, J-Kidd stepped up to hit a pair of huge 3’s in the 4th.

Two times in a row Dirk swung the ball to the open player and both times No.2 hit the downtown shot to give the Mavs a 112-99 advantage. J-Kidd talked with Dallasbasketball.com about stepping up to hit those big shots:

“Dirk was going great, so I had to be ready to knock down a shot to take some pressure off him. He became the playmaker and he found me twice.”

Great spacing broke down the Suns double-team and gave Jason open looks. With the Mavs up 13 with only a couple minutes left, the Suns tried to turn up the tempo. Carlisle countered by putting a lineup of 4 guards and Nowitzki. With Jason inbounding the ball successfully, the other players were able to handle the ball and force the Suns to foul them. Nowitzki, Terry, and Barea were sent to the line 8 times and made all 8 of their free throws.

Coach Carlisle talked with Mavs Moneyball about how important J-Kidd’s 3-pointer’s were:

“Kidd’s three’s were enormous. It got them into fouling mode a little earlier than they probably would have. It was helter-skelter in the last minute. These guys are a nightmare because they can make plays. They’ll throw in shots from anywhere, but we survived it. We’re happy with the win and now we’ve got to the hell out of here because we have a game tomorrow.”

Jason knocking down a big three at the end of the game won’t surprise anyone who have watched the Mavs as this season he has consistently nailed clutch shots. No.2 is shooting .403 % from the 3-point line, which is much improved over his career percentage of .341.

J-Kidd, who finished with a stat line of 12 points, 7 boards, 3 assists, and 4 steals, had another great game behind the arch as he went 4-8 from downtown. Jason laughde as he discussed with the Star-Telegram why all of his points came from three:

“For some reason, I couldn’t go inside the 3-point line. I had one of those electric collars on and it kept buzzing me.’’

NEXT UP
There’s no rest for the Mavs as they continue their road trip in Portland Wednesday night at 9pm CST.

The Trail Blazers have won 13 in a row at home, but the Mavs are 1 of only 5 times that has been able to win at the Rose Garden. With a victory Wednesday night, the Mavs can complete a season sweep as they also defeated Portland in Dallas 104-99.

RELATED STORIES
Mavericks 122, Phoenix 117 (ESPN.com, Mar. 10th, 2009)
http://espn.go.com/nba/boxscore?gameId=290310021
Dallas Mavericks blot out Suns to build playoff cushion (Star-Telegram, Mar. 11th, 2009)
http://www.star-telegram.com/287/story/1250775.html
Mavs Finish Suns: Postgame Quotes (Mavs Moneyball, Mar. 11th, 2009)
http://www.mavsmoneyball.com/2009/3/11/789234/mavs-finish-suns-postgame
Spacing, Spacing, Spacing: Mavs 122, Suns 117 (Dallasbasketball.com, Mar. 11th, 2009)
http://www.dallasbasketball.com/fullColumn.php?id=1411