TWO-HORSE TOWN

By Hal Habib

DALLAS - The countdown is on. It's T-minus 60 minutes to the first-ever NBA Finals game in Dallas, and clusters of fans have gathered with the idea of beating the heat (even though it's close to 100 degrees), getting inside the arena (see previous disclaimer) and beating the Heat (the basketball team trying to crash their party).

The deal is simple: Each group has 30 seconds to perform their Mavericks cheer and prove to the judges they're responsible for Big D's sudden shortage of blue paint, because everybody knows blue paint belongs on bodies, not walls.

Best-painted, original group gets inside the American Airlines Center.
Yes, this really is Dallas, where being True Blue used to mean supporting the Cowboys or, perhaps, the Cowboys, except of course during football season, when all that mattered was the Cowboys.

Truthfully, the moon will turn blue before that changes. But equally truthfully, for a few weeks, Dallas has become a two-horse town.

'This is not just a football town," Mavericks assistant coach Del Harris says. "It's a sports town, and they, like most cities, really love a winner."

Love isn't a bad word for it, because back outside the arena, there's a sea of signs: No way D- Wade. How the West was won. Go Let's Mavs (three fans who perhaps were too hydrated). Howard is my husband, in honor of Mavs guard forward Josh Howard. Five men wearing tear-away basketball pants reveal black Speedos underneath. "Put it back on!" someone yells, drawing chuckles.

"Dallas fans are great," says Los Angeles' James Goldstein, who lists "basketball" as his occupation and estimates he attends 110 NBA games annually. "I attend quite a few playoff games here every year, and I think the buzz at the arena is fantastic. There's an air of professionalism when it comes to the events here that are just so first class, major league, that when I return to L.A. and go to a game there, I feel like I'm at a minor league event."

Goldstein is hard to miss during Heat and Mavericks media sessions during the Finals, which he gets access to through his connections, with his wild, shoulder-length frizzy hair and bright outfits. He's friendly with many players and coaches, so much so, he says, that at one game in Miami, Shaquille O'Neal snatched his hat and put it on. He and Pat Riley also enjoyed some give-and-take during one interview session.

So Miami fans should brace for Goldstein's comparison between Heat and Mavs fans.

"I have to criticize the fans in Miami in terms of their regular season game attitude," Goldstein says. "Because more than any other place, even Los Angeles of all places, the Miami fans arrive so late for the games, the seats are more than 50 percent empty when the games start. And then at halftime, they all go out and get refreshments and don't seem to come back until midway in the third quarter. And then they leave the game early.

"Dallas fans are here at the beginning of the game and stay until the end."
You'd have to go back until the early 2000s to find a Mavericks home game that had an unsold seat. While the players have their goal - a title - the front office has its goal, as explained by a sign in the club's offices: "45 sellouts ... no excuses." Exhibitions, 41 regular-season games, it doesn't matter. No excuses.
Inside the American Airlines Center, 4S minutes of basketball are packaged around edgy entertainment, such as a video imploring everyone, "Mamas, don't let your babies grow up to be Heat fans" during a timeout.

Thursday's pre-game video feature depicted O'Neal, as King Kong, 'being conquered by Godzilla, portrayed by Dirk Nowitzki. Billionaire Mavs owner Mark Cuban once was fined by NBA Commissioner David Stern for a similar video, which restrains him the way those chains restrained Kong.

"Because of Cuban, I think this fan base is a little different because he encourages it," says David Moore, columnist for The Dallas Morning News. 'The other day, there were pregnant women painting their bellies in Mavericks blue and green. There's that sort of thing that you don't get with the Cowboys necessarily. He makes it OK to be completely over the top."

Moore, a native of Dallas, says the Mavs "wiII never compete with the Cowboys, but I think they're widening their circle of influence."

"David Stern always said, and I think it was accurate, when the Mavericks came here in ‘80, the whole thing was, 'Why would you put a basketball team here? After football, spring football is the second-biggest sport. I think you could make a pretty strong argument that after the Cowboys, the Mavericks have captured the interest of the area, more so than any of the other teams."

In an area that celebrated the Stars' Stanley Cup championship in 1999, Goldstein adds, "I can tell you that wherever I go in Dallas at night. I get stopped every two minutes by somebody who wants to talk basketball with me. If that's an indication that people are following basketball, then it's certainly become a basketball town."

As coach of the Houston Rockets in the early '80s, Harris recalls having to file a suit to enable his sons, Larry and Alex, to play basketball, in this football-crazed state. "Football ruled the state so strongly that you couldn't go to a basketball camp and play varsity basketball the next year," Harris says. "You could go to football camp, band camp, math camp, whatever camp, but you could not go to basketball camp."

Harris got his injunction and was out of the fight when it reached the U.S. Supreme Court, but he can laugh about it because shortly thereafter, the basketball rule was abolished.

"Now, as a result of all that, you have probably too much summer basketball being played in Texas," Harris says. 'These kids are playing 70 games over the summer."

The kids are playing, the pros are playing, people are watching. Since 1994, the Rockets and Spurs have combined to give Texas 42 percent of the NBA championships. Now, perhaps it's the Blue Man Group's turn to complete the slam.

While the Mavericks haven't grown up to be Cowboys, they have grown on the area.

"It's fun to see the fans riding around with Mavs flags on their cars," guard Darrell Armstrong says. "Everywhere I go, it seems like I see a Mavs flag. That's spirit. That's happiness. That's the fans saying, 'We are 110 percent behind this team.' It's just fun to see."