The Mavericks are 10-3 and tied with Phoenix for the best record in the Western Conference.

The best bit of fallout from that was on display after their 104-102 survival test against Sacramento on Friday night.

The Mavericks weren't the least bit impressed with themselves after the victory at American Airlines Center.

Oh, they're impressed with banking another win. But the way the victories are rolling in isn't making them puff their chests out.

"We're all disappointed because we all know we shouldn't be making these games tough on us," Drew Gooden said. "When we get comfortable being up nine or 10 points, we let teams claw back.

"We still haven't played a lot of the big teams. And with this team, I know when we see those teams, we'll play better."

But they can only play who is on the schedule and, for now, the Mavericks are beating the teams they should. They won their fifth in a row, matching their longest winning streak of last season.

Their bench came through with half of their points against the Kings, with Jason Terry, Tim Thomas and Kris Humphries doing the heavy lifting.

Together, they helped hold off a 29-point, 10-assist, seven-rebound night from Kings rookie Tyreke Evans.

The Mavericks were only up by three with 4:30 to go after an Evans layup, but Jason Terry and Quinton Ross scored the next six points to give them a 91-82 lead.

When Jason Kidd, who had 15 points on five 3-pointers, hit a 3 with 1:15 left, the Mavericks were up, 98-88. They survived a slew of mistakes in the final minute that allowed the Kings to get close, but not close enough to steal the win.

Still, that final minute did not sit well with coach Rick Carlisle.

"We've got to do better than we did," he said. "You give up three 3s in 24 seconds, that's not acceptable. It needs to get better – we will do better. But you can't just dwell on the negative. We're doing a lot of good things, too."

Like 10-3.

Injury update: Shawn Marion missed his second consecutive game with a sore left ankle. He said he's aiming for Tuesday's game against Golden State for his return.

"Just a couple more days and I should be good," Marion said. "It still hurts more in the shoe. I feel fine barefoot."

Carlisle said Erick Dampier's future should become clearer soon.

"I think we'll know sometime next week where things are at," he said. "I know there's still some testing being done."

Dampier became ill during pregame warm-ups at Detroit on Sunday.

Briefly: It was a homecoming of sorts for Kings coach Paul Westphal and assistant Mario Elie. Both were on the Mavericks' staff under Avery Johnson and Rick Carlisle. ... Westphal on Dirk Nowitzki scoring only 20 points: "That doesn't happen very often. You hate to waste those nights when he's not torching you." ... After he had 16 rebounds, including nine offensive boards – many his own misses several teammates compared Gooden to Hall of Famer Moses Malone, who was famous for playing volleyball with his own shots to pile up huge rebounding numbers.