By Mike Fisher -- DallasBasketball.com
      ‘Meant to be together.’ ‘A match made in heaven.’ ‘Soulmates.’
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      Unless you’re a major shareholder in Hallmark Inc., it’s all meaningless hooey.
      My cynicism is fueled in part by the Mavs’ ongoing struggles, struggles that might not be behind them even after a nice back-to-back roadie sweep this weekend, struggles that some are blaming on this team not being a ‘fit.’
      Or in other words, on this group not being ‘meant to be together,’ ‘a match made in heaven,’ ‘soulmates.’
      Maybe such fate-related concepts are turning things Dallas’ way. On Saturday at Phoenix the Mavs won, 113-90. They followed that up with Sunday night’s 101-88 win at the Clippers. Next outing: A home game against a third straight non-playoff contender, Atlanta.
      Meanwhile, Minnesota and San Antonio both lost their Sunday games, allowing fifth-place Dallas to creep nearer a favorable three seed.
      What does this have to do with soulmates? Three billion people on the planet, and somehow, some way, every 18-year-old girl in, say Hayseed, Kansas, finds her soulmate right there in Hayseed! (Imagine that! He works at the tire store right across the street from where you waitress at the café! Wow! It had to be meant to be – either that, or it’s because those are the only two stores on Main Street.)
      Oh, and your soulmate is always someone you find attractive; how is it nobody has an ugly soulmate? And often, isn’t your soulmate really the first/and or only person who will have sex with you? In fact, how come your soulmate is never your uncle or the local grocer or your sister or the local librarian but instead is always someone you want to bed?
      I’m not saying I don’t have a romantic bone in my body; I am saying that it is buried under a pile of pragmatic flesh. I’m not saying I don’t send flowers; I am saying the usual recipient is my mom. I’m not saying there definitely isn’t that special someone out there who was created just for you; I am saying that I’ll bet there are as many shotgun weddings and arranged marriages that end up working as there are unions that are all rose petals and candy hearts.
      Which takes us back to the Mavs and their lack of ‘fit’ – their basketball version of a shotgun wedding/arranged marriage.
      We knew going into this season, with Antoine Jamison and Antoine Walker being acquired so near Game 1, that there would be a few hiccups – a few conflicts over toilet-seat lids and toothpaste-tube caps, if you will.
      But we’re now 60-plus games into the year, more than three-quarters of the regular season complete. It is time to make the arranged marriage work, with no excuses and no other options.
      A tale of Dallas Cowboys past that applies here:
      Troy Aikman, Michael Irvin and Emmitt Smith were the centerpieces of the NFL’s last great dynasty. A perfect fit, right? Meant to be together, right? Soulmates?
      Well, yeah, except that for a time from 1989 to 1990, coach Jimmy Johnson though Steve Walsh was superior to Aikman, thought Irvin would never come back from knee surgery and therefore tried to trade him, and thought the ’90 Draft was all about acquiring linebacker James Francis instead of Emmitt.
      A match made in heaven? Hardly. But they realized the shotgun was pointed at the backs of their tuxedos. So they made the marriage work.
      Is Antoine Walker a busted experiment? Would the Mavs be better off with Nick Van Exel instead of Antoine Jamison? Should they have retained Raja Bell, pushed harder for Karl Malone, made a coaching change, whatever, all in pursuit of that fanciful ‘soulmate’ thing?
      Doesn’t matter. This group is what it is. Assembled for a purpose. Running out of excuses. Playoff success or failure looming.
      What usually drives the ‘soulmate’ concept is the heavenly thing, the God thing. That the reason Besty Sue and Billy Bob hooked up in Hayseed is that God put them together. I doubt that, and I think this:
      God is mighty busy nowadays. Too busy to sprinkle soulmate dust on the Dallas Mavericks.
      So they’re going to have to do what they did over the weekend. They’re going to have to do it for themselves.