TORONTO -- Dallas Mavericks center Nerlens Noel could return to the lineup Monday against the Toronto Raptors after missing the previous two games with a sore left knee.
"He's doing better," Mavericks coach Rick Carlisle said. "We're hoping he can play Monday. But that doesn't mean he will. It just means we're hoping he can. He's made progress each day so he will definitely travel."
The Mavericks, who are trying to grab a playoff spot, are beginning a four-game road trip at the Air Canada Centre after completing a 4-1 homestand after losing Saturday to the Phoenix Suns.
The Raptors, who are competing for a favorable playoff seeding despite the absence of injured point guard Kyle Lowry, completed a 2-3 trip with losses Friday to the Atlanta Hawks and Saturday to the Miami Heat.
"Look at the calendar, 15 games left (in the regular season)," Raptors guard DeMar DeRozan said. "That should be all the motivation we need right there. We don't have much time and every single game that we have to play is valuable. That's how we have to look at it."
The Raptors could have forward DeMarre Carroll back Monday. He returned Friday from a sprained left ankle but was a late scratch from the game Saturday.
The Raptors have had trouble scoring from 3-point territory recently, emphasizing the importance of Lowry, who is out for likely the rest of the regular season after having right wrist surgery.
The Raptors were 6-for-40 from 3-point range in their past two games. In the nine games they have played so far without Lowry, they are shooting 31 percent in 3-point attempts. They had been hitting on 37 percent of attempted 3-pointers before that point.
"It was a little bit of everything," said DeRozan, was held to 17 points on 5-for-16 shooting Saturday. "We had, what, five assists? OK, seven, it's just as bad, it don't make it no better. Missing shots as well. We just have to find our spots, find guys where they want it and execute. We can't keep relying on iso basketball or somebody making big shots or hoping somebody gets hot. We got to play together."
"It starts with everybody individually, including myself," guard Cory Joseph said. "Just playing harder from the get-go. Doing the little things, playing together. As long as we stick together we'll come out of this for sure. We're a good team. We've got a lot of talented players. We're in a little rough patch right now, but just like how you can fall in a rough patch quickly you can get out of it quickly. That's what we're hoping to do. We've just got to be better from the jump."
The Mavericks lost 100-98 to the Suns Saturday on a shot at the final buzzer.
Dirk Nowitzki scored 23 points on 10-for-14 shooting from the field and had 11 rebounds for his seventh double-double of the season.
The forward kept the Mavericks in the game early, going 5-for- 6 from the field with 13 points in the first quarter, while the rest of the team was 1-for-10 with 11 points.
"It's sad to get (a game like that from Nowitzki) and throw it away, because we couldn't close it," Carlisle said. "Look, we worked hard to get a six-point lead towards the end. With two minutes go to that's where you've got to bear down and you've got to get stops."
The loss was damaging to the Mavericks' playoff hopes.
"I think a lot of it falls on the starters and how we're getting off to (slow starts in) games," forward Harrison Barnes said. "Containing penetration, that was the issue in the second half of the (Los Angeles) Lakers game, the game against the (Brooklyn) Nets (Friday) and then (Saturday). So we just have to do a better job of keeping guys in front of us."
