Tag: American Airlines Center

Did the Mavs know something early Saturday?

How excited is Dallas Mavericks owner Mark Cuban to begin the season and hoist his first championship banner over the American Airlines Center?

Reports from media members who were at the AAC early Saturday morning after the Dallas Stars-Toronto Maple Leafs hockey game earlier in the evening have been firing some interesting tweets throughout the evening.

The lockout was settled at about 2 a.m. CST. But James Mirtle, a hockey writer for the Toronto Globe Mail, tweeted that workmen were starting to put down the facility’s basketball floor .

And David Alter, a reporter for the Fan radio station in Toronto, evenof the floor in place before the settlement was announced.

Considering the championship, should we be surprised about Cuban’s enthusiasm?

Let the games begin, thankfully.

What we’re missing tonight with the lockout

I can’t wait. Three games to start the season. It should be great after all that excitement still so palpable from last season’s playoffs.

Oh, that’s right. We’ve got the lockout. We’ll be missing three games. Two of them would have been televised, and the other one would have been available on my free preview of NBA-TV like always.

Chicago and Dallas would have started things off tonight at 7 p.m. Derrick Rose vs. Dirk Nowitzki. For good measure we would have seen the Mavericks’ championship banner raised to the rafters of the American Airlines Center. And after that, we could have seen Kevin Durant, Russell Westbrook and the Oklahoma City Thunder against Kobe Bryant and the Los Angeles Lakers.

In between those breaks, we could have switched over to watch Houston at Utah.

Instead, we’ll be able to watch “The Biggest Loser,” “Dancing with the Stars” and “Body of Proof.”

My wife will be happy. She usually doesn’t get too excited for NBA basketball much before Christmas.

But missing these first three games really drives home the point that we’re really missing games now.

Enjoy those reality shows tonight.

And don’t curse David Stern and Billy Hunter too much while you’re watching them.

Cuban couldn’t stick to silence after Mavs’ WCF triumph

Vociferous Dallas owner Mark Cuban understandably couldn’t resist exulting in his team’s Western Conference Finals series triumph over Oklahoma City Wednesday night.

Since the beginning of the playoffs, we’ve been , who has been seen or heard little during the Mavericks’ run to their first NBA Finals berth since 2006.

After Dallas forward Dirk Nowitzki said he would prefer for his boss to take less of the spotlight before semifinals series against the Los Angeles Lakers, Cuban has kept his mouth shut.

That is, until Wednesday night.

He side-stepped the question of why he has been so quiet and then thanked the fans at the American Airlines Center for their support.

But then, we saw the old Cuban emerge — if only for a few seconds.

Cuban couldn’t resist punctuating his speech by screaming “We ain’t done yet!”

Dallas fans then responded with chants of “Beat the Heat.”  

Cuban has been one of the biggest villains for Spurs Nation over the years with his comments about the city of San Antonio and disdain for the Spurs franchise.

Has there been enough of a change for Spurs fans to forgive his previous missteps as they revel in a championship run for another team from the state?

Or would they like to see the Mavericks lose in four games in the NBA Finals to whomever emerges from the Eastern Conference?