DALLAS (AP) – Dennis Schroder scored 28 points in his first game as the front man for Atlanta and the rebuilding Hawks spoiled rookie Dennis Smith Jr.’s solid Dallas debut, beating the Mavericks 117-111 in the opener Wednesday night.
Marco Belinelli, a familiar face for the Mavericks as a former rival with San Antonio, added 20 points and was 4 of 6 from 3-point range to help the Hawks in their first game after letting Paul Millsap leave in free agency and dumping Dwight Howard.
Smith scored his first NBA points on an alley-oop dunk to open the Dallas scoring and finished with 16 points and a game-high 10 assists.
Dirk Nowitzki scored 10 points on 4-of-14 shooting and the 39-year-old German joined Kobe Bryant (Lakers) as the only players to reach 20 seasons with the same franchise. He was on the bench in the back-and-forth closing minutes.
Dewayne Dedmon followed a miss by Schroder for a layup to put Atlanta up 113-111 with 58 seconds left. Taurean Prince rebounded a missed 3 from Belinelli with the shot clock off and made both free throws for a four-point lead.