Two games left, and zero hesitation remaining. It's already official, no matter what happens Friday night to the twice-defending NBA champions.

They're vulnerable.

The question that hung over the Los Angeles Lakers all season, with an answer promised us in the playoffs, isn't being asked any more. You no longer wonder about LA ? really vulnerable, or just teasing? ? because you've either seen or heard about the first five games of the Western Conference finals.

Sacramento has won three of them and came within a 3-pointer at the buzzer by Robert Horry of winning Game 4, too. From here, whether or not these young Kings can actually finish the series off, you also know that they're going to keep getting better, with a little team from Dallas determined to spend and deal and follow the same depth-trumps-stars blueprint.

Dallas star Dirk Nowitzki was scheduled to undergo surgery to remove bone spurs in his left ankle Friday? until he suffered a sinus infection.  The surgery has now been postponed writes Jodie Valade of the Dallas Morning News, but Nowitzki is expected to have the surgery some time next week after he recovers from his illness.

Mark Cuban's second full year as the Mavericks' owner brought a stint working at Dairy Queen, another whopping fine from the NBA, another major trade, and the same finish as last season, a second-round elimination. Cuban sat down with The Morning News to reflect on the past season and predict what is in store in the future.

Q: What are your overall thoughts on the season?

A: We made progress. The Question is, what can you do to get to a championship-caliber team? We had to upgrade the past couple years, and I think we've done that. Now, what I think we need to do is just give this team some time to be together. I think we overused our guys. We really focused on protecting ourselves in terms of making the playoffs. We'll go into this season much more confident. It won't be about whether we can make the playoffs. It won't even be about whether we're No. 1 or winning the Midwest. It will be about what can we do to make sure we're in the best possible shape for the playoffs. Because that hurt us this year. We're going through a transitional phase. The trade helped us get to that point where I'm a lot more confident.

Should Karl Malone decide to seek an offseason trade away from Utah, the Mailman might want to scratch Dallas from his list of potential new addresses.

Two days after his club was bounced from the NBA playoffs, Mavericks owner Mark Cuban squashed the popular notion that a Malone-to-Dallas swap could soon be in the works.

"It's pretty much impossible for us to do it," Cuban said Wednesday via e-mail, the dot-com billionaire's preferred method of communication.

The Jazz and Mavs did explore the possibility of dealing Malone to Dallas last offseason ? a move that might have been approved by Malone, who has a trade-approval clause in his current contract. The Jazz, however, were unwilling to accept the Mavs' offer of forward Juwan Howard, nixing any possible deal at that time.

Jodie Valade writes for the Dallas Morning News that the Mavericks conducted exit physicals Wednesday.  Two surgeries are necessary, and a third is possible soon.

Dirk Nowitzki will have surgery May 24 to have bone spurs on his left ankle removed. He missed six games during the season because of various ankle injuries, worsened by the spurs.

Adrian Griffin will have back surgery Tuesday to correct a troublesome disk. Griffin missed 22 games this season because of back spasms and has battled back problems for the past couple years.

Nick Van Exel still has not decided on specifics of elbow surgery. He missed time with Denver because of the injury before arriving in Dallas in a Feb. 21 trade.

Additionally, Eduardo Najera, who broke his right thumb before Game 1 against Sacramento in the Western Conference semifinals, had his thumb placed in a cast Wednesday. He will wear the cast for 10-14 days and then be evaluated.

Dwain Price of the Star Telegram writes that Dallas is already thinking of ways it can improve its interior defense this offseason, after this weakness was badly exposed by the Sacramento Kings.

Mark Cuban will have discussions with agent Bill Duffy about possibly acquiring LA Clippers center Michael Olowakandi.  Olowakandi is a restricted free agent, but there has been tension between him and the Clippers, so it may be possible to acquire him somehow.

Also, Wang Zhizhi will become a restricted free agent this offseason, which may spell complications for the Mavericks.  Wang's next contract will be signed under new Chinese legislation that will require him to give half his income to the Chinese government.  Given how complicated the last negotiation for Wang was, the Mavs expect the next to be difficult as well.

Coach Don Nelson was already in off-season Maui attire: a black shirt displaying a parrot and a blue beverage on the front. And owner Mark Cuban already was referring to the 2001-2002 season in past tense, calling it "last year."

No, Mavericks management and players were not in denial as they met Tuesday afternoon at American Airlines Center ? a postmortem of a season they never fathomed would end so soon.

Roughly 17 hours after their playoff run abruptly ended in Sacramento, the Mavericks were still in semi-shock after cleaning out their locker room stalls. But amid the disappointment, they already had their eyes on the future.

"Last year's over," Cuban said. "I was as down as I could possibly be [Monday]. Now you go to work."

Even Nelson, who turns 62 on Wednesday and plans to be at his Maui home by Thursday, said: "I can't hardly wait until next year, to be quite honest, to coach this team. I wish training camp were starting in a few days."

"I love this team," Nelson gushed. "It's just young."

So the Mavericks' greatest flaw as they concluded their season Monday with a 4-1 second-round playoff loss to the Sacramento Kings might be that there simply wasn't enough time. The current form of the Mavericks played together just 35 games after a Feb. 21 trade brought in Raef LaFrentz and Nick Van Exel.

The Mavericks' Big Three of Michael Finley, Steve Nash and Dirk Nowitzki already have established a solid core. The number of valuable pieces around that nucleus, now, is growing. Chemistry and familiarity are the things the Mavericks lack most.

"It takes a lot of getting bumped around and bruised and battered, fighting your way as a team, to get stronger," Nelson said. "Add a piece, and then, eventually, after all the scars, you learn from those situations.
"It's easier now, as you add a piece here and there and you already have a nucleus to build on. You usually start improving then, and maybe we can get to the next level. We're at a pretty good level now, by the way."

For the second consecutive season, the Mavericks were eliminated from the Western Conference semifinals in five games by the NBA's top-seeded team. Even so, the Mavericks think they're a lot closer to contending for the championship than they were only 365 days ago.

"Last year, we clawed our way out of the first round," said point guard Steve Nash as the Mavericks cleaned out their lockers Tuesday following the team's 114-101 season-ending loss at Sacramento on Monday night. "This year, we breezed through the first round and were a few possessions away from still playing. It was a totally different team and a totally different year. We're a much better team and, hopefully, we'll be a much better team next year."

This season, the Mavericks won a franchise- best 57 games and finished one game behind Midwest Division champion San Antonio. Nash and Dirk Nowitzki were all-stars; Nowitzki was a second-team All-NBA pick, Nash a third-team selection.

It was a jubilant Mavericks team that entered the playoffs against Sacramento.

It was a pensive one that went on summer vacation Monday night.

The Mavs owe their unwanted free time to their season-long dismissal of a fundamental defensive concept.

That being not only to maintain at least a semblance of a game-long control of a foe's offensive output but to own the ability to crunch it hard in the final moments.

The Mavs, a fun bunch to watch, wound up watching the Kings display their offensive pyrotechnics down through the games' climaxes.