Los Angeles Lakers routed Dallas Mavericks 115-89 on the way to register their first road victory of the current NBA season Saturday night.
Kobe Bryant, Metta World Peace, and Antawn Jamison scored 19 points each. The helpless Mavericks could not put breaks on the Lakers offense. Six Los Angeles players hit two-digit scores.
World Peace went on to hit three quick 3-pointers to lead Los Angeles to score 36 points before the league's leading scorer Bryant started assault.
The Lakers crossed 100 marks for the first time under their new coach Mike D'Antoni.
''Metta played great. There was no reason not to,'' The Associated Press quoted D'Antoni as saying. ''The force that we had rolling, and the way the ball moves, he'll get it and he should get 10 3s a night.''
The Lakers took lead right from the start, with the Mavericks trailing by 13 points at the end of the first quarter. In the second quarter, they scored only 15 against the Lakers' 29 points. Bryant shot a 3-pointer with 1.9 left in the second quarter and helped his team to lead 65-38 at the halftime.
Jamison grabbed 15 rebounds to help the Lakers win the game.
''We have a lot of weapons offensively,'' Jamison said. ''We've got to utilize that, and we weren't before this. We moved the ball the way we needed to.''
World Peace was in great form against the Mavericks. He added the first 10 Los Angeles points and finished the first quarter with 16 to help his team take a very important lead. He grabbed six rebounds and had three assists as well.
''I thought (World Peace) was the one who got them going,'' Mavericks coach Rick Carlisle said. ''It put them in a really tough mode defensively, and we didn't execute well against them.''
For the Mavericks, Vince Carter was the top scorer with 16 points. He was playing in his 1,000th game. Jae Crowder added 15 points and grabbed four rebounds.
''We know he's not going to be back for a while,'' Carlisle said. ''When we were 4-1, it wasn't a problem. We've got enough here to win games provided that everyone is doing their job, and tonight we didn't do it.''
The Lakers outscored the Mavericks 26-24 in the fourth quarter and won the game.
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