Today in Sports.

Ahh Yes. What a good day in the metroplex yesterday. A big Mavs win, a big Rangers win and a Stars win to end the season.

Mavericks: What a great win. The Mavs were down 14 at one point and came back to win. Thanks in part to the Big German , but how about that defense? Holding the high flying Suns to 9 points I think counts as a lock down defensive effort. Avery favorite, Devean George was awesome in the fourth he disrupted the pick and roll that Nash and Amare ran to death. After all the fire Avery stuff, time for a little Avery love. If Avery came up with that then I commend him, George was quick enough to guard Nash when he had to and big enough not to be abused by Amare. Another thing I thought Avery did that I thought worked wonders, is running the pick and roll to ignite the offense. How unconventional was that? Dirk and Damp running the pick and roll? Hey, it was effective and Dirk abused Shaq time and time again off the dribble. However, I don't want to get too excited. Last time we thought they turned the corner vs Golden St. Then LA smacked us back to reality.

“It felt great to finally get over the hump,” said Nowitzki, who logged more than 38 minutes, including every second of the fourth quarter. “Everyone in the locker room was pretty hyped up that we had finally pulled this one out, and hopefully this can build some momentum.

“We still have some tough games until the playoffs. If we can get some momentum here in these last games, then we could be a very dangerous team in the playoffs.”

Let's hope so.

Rangers: Couldn't ask much more than what we've seen so far. Albeit, 3-3 isn't all that great. But, when you consider how the teams played and the fact that they haven't played a home game I'd consider the start of the season an overwhelming success. Through six games the Rangers starters have an era of 2.31 and all but Jennings have thrown at least six innings. The only negative so far has been the atrocious defense. Hopefully that's just jitters to begin the season, but the defense wasn't all that great last year either....Laird fueled the offense yesterday And Padilla went a strong 7 innings. This stood out:

When Washington went to him after the sixth, Padilla, with 93 pitches under his belt, said he wanted to go one more. "First time," Washington acknowledged. "Last year, he didn't say much."
"Everybody was patting each other on the back,"(Padilla said) "I think it's important that all the starters are doing the job and that we're all talking to each other and helping each other. We need to keep doing that."

Awesome. Is Padilla showing maturity? Time will tell.

Stars. What a last game of the season, huh? Every few minutes a fight would break out and the physicality of the game was incredibly high even for division opponents. Well, now the real season begins, as the Stars try to erase playoff memories of the past and make a run at Lord Stanley once again. They get a tough draw to begin with the defending champs Anaheim Ducks. They've played the Ducks well this season and even though they won't be favored here, I think this is a good match up for them and they should be primed to make a run at this thing.

Viewing: NCAA championship. Kansas vs Memphis 8:21 CBS