Why the Dallas Mavericks Were Able to Sweep the Memphis Grizzles in the First Round of the NBA Playoffs

Most of the Western Conference playoff series were exciting and entertaining. All of them except one: Dallas vs. Memphis. This was the only playoff series in which a team got swept. This series also showed just how dominant the Mavericks were in their 4 to 0 series win.

This year coach Avery Johnson greatly improved his team in his first full year as coach. He improved their team defense and his team learned to hustle and play hard under his leadership. The Mavericks were also led by MVP candidate Dirk Nowitzki. Nowitzki is a real difference maker and a lethal scoring threat. His size at seven feet makes it hard for power forwards and centers to match his height, strength and quickness. Dirk has a great scoring touch to shoot the 3 point shot deep beyond the arch, post up his man, or take his defender off of the dribble and shoot a layup.

In addition, this year marked the emergence of Josh Howard, Marquiese Daniels and their center Diop. Howard and Daniels brought much needed energy to the Mavs and they became a fast break team that played tough defense and scored at will which became a lethal combination. Diop provided great defense at the center position and often played better than Erik Dampier who got paid a lot of money to come to Dallas as a free agent.

The Memphis Grizzlies for most of the season was led by Paul Gasol who had a great year. At his size at 7 feet, he had a great post up game and was a strong rebounder. His supporting cast however was only average and no real second scoring threat ever emerged in this series.

With Dallas having homecourt advantage in the series and no real scoring threat besides Gasol emerging from Memphis, it is easy to understand how Memphis got swept in this series.