Strange Mavericks' loss

It's a long season and bad teams beat good teams every week. But no result this season was more flukey than the Knick's 128-94 win Dallas on Saturday. Let us count the ways ...

• According to the Elias Sports Bureau, the 34-point margin was the largest in NBA history in a game that ended a winning streak of at least 13 games.

• The Mavs beat the Knicks by 50 points in New York on January 24th. According to Elias, the 84-point turnaround is the largest within one season in NBA history.

• It was a road-road back-to-back for the Knicks, and the Mavs hadn't played since Wednesday. Prior to Saturday, the Knicks were 2 win and 13 loss on the second night of a back-to-back, and Dallas was 8 win 0 loss when they had exactly two days of rest.

• The Mavs had won seven straight games at home against the Eastern Conference, and the Knicks were 1 win 8 loss on the road against the West.

• Exactly one week earlier, the Knicks lost to the New Jersey Nets by 20 points.

It was a strange streak for the Mavs, because they hadn't been all that consistent on either side of the ball. But no one expected the streak to end in the strangest of ways.

The loss dropped Dallas to fifth in this week's rankings. The longest current winning streak is now six games, held by the Bobcats, Bucks and Nuggets.

With one notable exception , it was another week during which the good teams continued to play well and the bad teams continued to play poorly. So it was difficult for teams in the top 10 to move up and for the teams in the bottom 10 to move down. The Portland Blazers actually moved down a spot after going 4 win 0 loss for the week.

Ben et Flo et John