McGrady, Rockets move one-up on Dallas

Dallas, TX (Basketball News) - Tracy McGrady poured in a game-high 34 points to lead the Houston Rockets past the Dallas Mavericks, 98-86, in Game 1 of the Western Conference quarterfinals.

"We just wanted to come out and hit those guys first," McGrady said. "That was the most important thing. Those guys are a different ball club than we faced the last time. Coming into the game, we wanted to hit them first and control the tempo."

Mike James contributed a playoff career-high 16 points for the Rockets, seeded fifth in the West, as they grabbed a 1-0 lead in the best-of-seven series with Game 2 slated for Monday at the AmericanAirlines Center.

The Rockets, who were eliminated in five games by the Los Angeles Lakers in the opening round last season, have not won a playoff series since 1997.

Dirk Nowitzki led Dallas with 21 points, but hit just one field goal in the second half. Josh Howard and Jason Terry added 17 points apiece for the fourth-seeded Mavericks, who entered the postseason with wins in their final nine regular season contests.

"The Rockets played a terrific game," Mavericks head coach Avery Johnson stated. "They out in the first quarter and set the tone for the whole game. We were playing catch up for the rest of the game."

Nowitzki committed six of the Mavericks 13 turnovers tonight. In three regular season matchups versus Houston, he committed at total of two turnovers in 127 minutes of play.

Trailing by as many as 19 in the first half, Dallas got back into the contest in the third quarter, as it used an 11-2 run - including seven straight points at one point - to creep within seven, 67-60, and went into the final 12 minutes trailing 70-63.

The Mavericks continued to keep the heat on Houston in the early stages of the final quarter and pulled within four, 75-71, on three Jerry Stackhouse free throws.

That would be as close as Dallas would get, though, as James scored six of the next eight points to give the Rockets an eight-point lead. After a Stackhouse layup, Houston answered at the other end with a Jon Barry three to make it 84-73 with 5:50 left in the game.

Dallas did not threaten after that, as Houston rolled to the 12-point victory.

"Once we go back and look at the tape we’re going to be kind of disappointed in a lot of the things we talked about," Stackhouse said. "We just didn’t execute defensively. I think we’ll be better offensively, but we’ve just got to lock into what they are trying to do."

Yao Ming and Dikembe Mutombo combined for 19 points and 16 rebounds for Houston, which has now won eight straight and 19 of their last 25 games.

Tied at 14 with just over four minutes to play in the first, the Rockets closed the stanza with a 12-2 run to carry a 10-point advantage into the second quarter.

Houston continued to pour it on in the early stages of the second, as it went up by as many as 19, 39-20, just 3:20 into the period on a McGrady three- pointer, which capped an 8-0 spurt.

Dallas managed to get the deficit down to 11, but went into the locker room trailing 52-40.

McGrady had 17 points to lead all scorers, while Nowitzki paced the Mavericks through the first 24 minutes with 11 points.