One of the opening games in the 2011-12 National Basketball Association season will feature the match-up between the Dallas Mavericks and Miami Heat in a rematch of the 2011 Finals.
The Mavericks, led by Dirk Nowitzki, Jason Terry and Jason Kidd, beat the fancied Heat team of LeBron James, Dwyane Wade and Chris Bosh in six games.
The celebration is over and now its time to get back to work for Dallas after winning its maiden NBA title.
Nowitzki, Terry and Kidd are back for another tour of duty but not Tyson Chandler, JJ Barea, DeShawn Stevenson, Peja Stojakovic and Caron Butler. Recruited to fill in the void they left are Lamar Odom, Vince Carter, Delonte West and Brandan Wright.
Key returnees for head coach Rick Carlisle include Shawn Marion, Brendan Haywood, Dominique Jones and Rodrigue Beaubois, who was sidelined for most of last season. Iam Mahinmi and Brian Cardinal, two bench players who made significant contributions in Dallas' title run, are also back this season.
Carlisle is confident that his team anchored on Nowitzki and Kidd can regain the Larry O'Brien Trophy although he admitted that they still have more adjustments to do.
"Dirk, Shawn Marion and Lamar were all out there for one stretch and that is a lineup we felt we had to look at," he told ESPN.com's Jeff Caplan.
"We are going to be playing it some here and there, not sure how much, but the only way to get everybody more acclimated is to play them through some of these struggles. I’m going to remain upbeat, but realistic about it. We have work to do."
Nowitzki echoed his coach's sentiments.
"I think our goal cannot be to be the best team right now," the former NBA MVP said.
"In a week our goal is to get better and also better game to game. Hopefully by April, May and June we can be back to where we were last year. However, we know we are still a [work in progress]."
While the Mavericks enjoyed their success over the past few months, it was the opposite for the Heat. James and co. were criticized after losing in the finals despite being the favored team.
Thus the Heat players were left licking their wounds and could not wait to redeem themselves in the upcoming season.
Miami head coach Erik Spoelstra was also heavily criticized but the organization opted to retain him in their quest for the franchise's second ever NBA title. And the youthful mentor is looking forward to the challenge.
"We feel confident and we're certainly much more comfortable than we were last year at this time, even though things are moving at an unusually fast pace," he told Sports Radio.
"It's like that for everybody, so we're all in the same boat in the league in terms of a condensed schedule."
Spoelstra will once again bank on James, Wade and Bosh to deliver and hope to get major contributions from new acquisitions Eddy Curry and Shane Battier.
Returning to the team this year are Udonis Haslem, Joel Anthony, Mario Chalmers and Eddie House. Veterans Juwan Howard, James Jones and Mike Miller also remained with the club.
Gone are Mike Bibby, Jamaal Magloire and Zydrunas Ilgauskas.
