DALLAS –Dirk Nowitzki had 23 points, eight rebounds and Monte Ellis chipped in 22 points as the Dallas Mavericks (28-21) handed the Cleveland Cavaliers (16-32) their third straight loss by a final of 124-107 at the American Airlines Arena.

Box score

Kyrie Irving had 27 points and eight assists to lead the Wine and Gold effort. Luol Deng (18 points) and Tristan Thompson (17 points, eight rebounds) also contributed offensively in the loss.

“I thought offensively we did some nice things out there,” said head coach Mike Brown. I thought we had some great looks from the perimeter – especially early on in the game that did not go in. The ball was moving fairly well. The spacing was pretty good. Of course as the game went on and we went through stretches where we couldn’t score Dallas took advantage of it and they got some easy buckets. We were a little late tagging which made us a little late getting out contesting shots and they knocked down some threes to stretch the game.”

The Dallas 3-point shooting proved to be the difference maker in this one as Cleveland allowed the Mavericks to shoot 46 percent (12 for 26) from beyond the arc for the game. The defense gave up 55 percent shooting as a whole to Dallas – something Brown sees as a definite work in progress.

“A lot of times we are a little reliant on our offense to take care of our defense,” said Brown. “But right now we are not going to outscore anybody so we have to try to get back to being a little gritty on the defensive end of the floor and utilize that to try and get us a win.”

Opening up play in the first quarter, both teams pulled out the stops offensively as Cavs guard Kyrie Irving and Mavericks guard Monte Ellis each scored eight first quarter points to pace their teams early on.

With Jarrett Jack back in the starting lineup for the second consecutive game and the team looking for some continuity on offense, the Wine and Gold displayed stellar perimeter passing and off-ball movement, but still found themselves down a bucket 27-25 after one.

With C.J. Miles in to start the second quarter off the Cavalier bench, Cleveland kept pace with Dallas and notched things up at 35-35 behind an Anthony Bennett layup which forced a Maverick timeout.

Coming out of the huddle, Dallas would go on the offensive as they put together a 17-4 run capped off with a couple of back-to-back 3-pointers by Dirk Nowitzki.

Following a Mike Brown timeout, the Cavs gathered themselves and were able to trim into the deficit to make it a 59-52 affair behind some solid work by Anthony Bennett (eight first half points) to close the opening 24 minutes of basketball.

Nowitzki led all scorers with 16 at the intermission as Dallas shot 54 percent in the opening half and had the Wine and Gold defense looking for answers as they went into the locker room down seven.

Connecting on four of six field goals to start the third quarter, Cleveland continued where they left off to close the first half as they cut the lead to 64-61 after a pair of Luol Deng makes at the charity stripe. But just as the Cavs were getting back into this one, the Dallas bench quickly opened up a double-digit advantage as Devin Harris (16 points) and Brandan Wright (14 points) stretched the lead to 91-76 in the waning minutes of the third.

Rolling into the fourth it would be more of the same as Dallas would open up the proverbial flood gates and put this one out of reach – downing the Cavs 124-107.

“We got to start making that extra effort,” said guard Jarrett Jack. “Whatever it takes. We drill it practice, we go over these situations time and time again, we are definitely prepared for the moment, but it is up to us to be able to execute our defensive strategies and be able to limit these teams to one shot per possession or to put them under duress like the situations call for that we go over. When you give an opportunity like that to a team like [Dallas] to go on a run it’s tough to come back from it.”

Post-game shots

With his 5 rebounds Monday night, Anderson Varejao eclipsed the 4,000 rebound milestone for his career. Varejao joins the likes of Cavalier greats Zydrunas Ilguaskas, Hot Rod Williams, and Brad Daugherty as the fourth member of the Cavs’ 4,000 point, 4,000 rebound club.

Anthony Bennett had another strong outing off the bench as he continues to see more minutes in Mike Brown’s rotation scoring 11 points before fouling out in the fourth quarter for the first time in his young career.

Of note, guard Dion Waiters – the third leading reserve scorer in the league – was limited to 0 points on 0 for 4 shooting in 10 minutes of play in the loss. Head Coach Mike Brown said that was by design after Jack and Miles played well early on – cutting into some of his minutes.

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