NEW ORLEANS _ On a Friday night when the Mavericks surrendered 41 first-quarter points and their fans pitched a collective conniption on Twitter, two things long, long overdue happened.
The Mavericks collected their wits and dignity and rallied from a 16-point first-half deficit to pull out a 123-116 victory over New Orleans behind Luka Doncic's triple-double and late-game heroics. And they actually won on national TV after going 0-7 on ESPN and TNT telecasts last season.
No, ESPN and its audience did not get the Doncic-Zion Williamson showdown that was anticipated when the schedule came out, but it did get a wildly entertaining game at Smoothie King Center.
Doncic (25 points, 10 rebounds, 10 assists) hit a floater in the lane to give Dallas a 117-113 lead with 1:53 left. Then, with 1:22 remaining, he sank a 3-pointer from the left wing, pushing the Mavericks' lead to seven.
It was Dallas' first road-opening win since the 2015-16 season, which the Mavericks hope not coincidentally was the last time they made the playoffs.
This also, believe it or not, is the first 2-0 Mavericks start since the 2004-2005 season, four years before Rick Carlisle took over as coach.
The Mavericks got 24 points Kristaps Porzingis, 17 of them in the first half. They also got 20 points and seven assists from Delon Wright.
Trailing 43-27 with 11:27 left in the second quarter, the Mavericks outscored the Pelicans 45-27 to take a 72-64 halftime lead.
Neither team could pull away in the second half. Dallas took a 95-93 lead into the fourth quarter.
"A lot of the things come down to execution," Carlisle said of winning on the road. "Execution can be very basic things. It's possession of the ball. One extra turnover or one less rebound can be a loss, just like that.
"Those two areas are big and with a young team that's learning to play together and learning to win together, you've got to develop an attitude to take into road games, where environments are hostile. You've got to use that kind of environment to shore up that focus a little more sharply as a group."
Dallas' road record was 9-32 each of the past two seasons. In 2016-17, the Mavericks were 12-29 on the road.
Clearly, to have any chance of breaking their three-season playoff drought they must significantly improve on the road. And New Orleans, even without Williamson (knee surgery) for the first six-to-eight weeks of the season, figures to be one of the teams Dallas must beat out for one of the last playoff spots.
On a rain-soaked night in New Orleans, the Mavericks appeared to be lurching toward a repeat of last season's embarrassing road opener, when they lost 121-100 to a Phoenix team that would win just 18 more times the rest of the season.
The previous season, Dallas lost its road opener at Houston, 107-91. You get the picture. These road openers haven't been pretty.
But after getting outscored 28-10 in the paint in the first quarter, the Mavericks rallied from the 16-point deficit to take the lead, 57-55, on a Jalen Brunson layup with 3:30 left in the half.
