Josh Robbins of the Orlando Sentinel: There are two new aspects to Nik Vucevic these days. First, as everybody knows, Vucevic and the Orlando Magic agreed to a four-year contract extension that should keep him with the team through the 2018-19 season. The second is a new characteristic that Vucevic hopes to display all season: more confidence when he receives the ball in the low post. Vucevic made 56.3 percent of his shot attempts during the preseason, and the Magic were hoping for a big game from him in the season opener Tuesday night against the New Orleans Pelicans. "I just try to be aggressive," Vucevic said. "I feel like this preseason I've been able to get the ball a lot close to the basket to where I feel very comfortable, to where I can make a quick move. If I get close to the basket, my teammates want me to score, want me to go at the basket."

Jimmy Smith of The Times-Picayune: What a front-court combination this could shape up to be for the Pelicans this season. Newcomer Omer Asik had his first Pelicans' double-double in the bag by halftime, and returning All-Star Anthony Davis picked up where he left off last season, threatening a triple-double in Game 1. Davis finished with 26 points, 17 rebounds and nine blocks. Asik also had five blocked shots against the Magic, but the big guy had his hands full with Orlando center Nikola Vucevic, who finished with 15 points and 23 rebounds. It's clear that the Asik-Davis duo is an upgrade compared to last year's Davis-center-by-committee groupings.

Buck Harvey of the San Antonio Express-News: Tuesday, without Tiago Splitter available, Bonner and Diaw went at Nowitzki. None of it was easy, just as the series against Dallas last season wasn't. The Mavericks took a 10-point lead early in the second half. And without Splitter,Kawhi Leonard and Patty Mills, the Spurs needed the same three who sat together in June to play as they did in June. They did, scoring nine of the Spurs' final 12 points. Duncan posted Tyson Chandler twice. Ginobili made a back-cut for a score. And, after Nowitzki had given Dallas a two-point lead, Parker merely tossed in his fourth 3-pointer in four attempts. “I was like, hey, it's going to go in tonight,” Parker said. “I can't do worse than I did in the preseason.” The shots won't always fall. They not only need the three who are out, they also need the others to stay healthy. And as it was in the OKC series, it can still come down to a play or two. But Tuesday also showed what happened after the celebration stopped and the rings were distributed. Duncan, Ginobili and Parker reacted as if these are still the good, old days. Maybe, in their next sit-down together, they can elaborate.

Eddie Sefko of The Dallas Morning News: One NBA game is way too small of a sample size to get riled up about anything. But this certainly wasn’t the kind of showing Chandler Parsons was hoping for in his Dallas Mavericks’ debut. The marquee free-agent signing of the summer had a complete dud going in the season opener Tuesday night, a 101-100 heartbreaker against the defending champion San Antonio Spurs. He missed seven of his first eight shots before nailing a 3-pointer with 2:42 to play to pull the Mavericks within 96-94. He finished the game by misfiring on a 3-pointer just before the buzzer. ... Parsons offered no excuses. ... None of the Mavericks voiced any concern about Parsons, who averaged 16.6 points, 5.5 rebounds and 4 assists last season with Houston before signing with the Mavericks for three years and $46-million. All that can be done is to chalk this up as one of those off nights that happens to all NBA players in their career.

Jonathan Feigen of the Houston Chronicle: With the lead up to 26 points, Dwight Howard pulled in a rebound and Bryant's long-awaited return had been reduced to carrying an overmatched, undermanned team nowhere near far enough. So with the Rockets well on their way to a 108-90 blowout win to begin the season Tuesday night, Bryant and Howard got together one last time to put on a show more memorable than anything they had on the floor. Bryant began by smacking at Howard's swinging forearms. Howard connected with an elbow. They both entertained lip-readers, with Bryant calling either Howard or the foul, "soft." Howard smiled and shouted, "I know you, dog." Bryant followed with his angriest, "Try me." Howard had begun the day asked about reports that players do not want to play with Bryant, repeating again he signed with the Rockets as a free agent not to leave Los Angeles but to play for Houston. He added, however, a prophetic, "I didn't leave LA because I was afraid of Kobe." Apparently not.

Bill Plaschke of the Los Angeles Times: On a night that served as a prolonged indictment of Lakers management, the other stand-up veteran besides Kobe Bryant was Lakers boss Jeanie Buss, who sat up in her usual first-row-behind-courtside seat and greeted fans and cynics alike. She didn't shy away from tough questions or conciliatory hugs. She even did a national television interview between quarters. Say this much for the late Jerry Buss' daughter, she is not shying away from the heat. This is the same Buss who publicly stood up for Bryant recently after he was derided by anonymous sources in a story that detailed how nobody wants to play with him. It is true that some free agents, Dwight Howard in particular, have chafed at the idea of playing next to the intense Bryant. But that's not why these Lakers are so bad. In the end, players always follow the money, and because of their huge commitment to Bryant, the Lakers just don't have the right kind of money. The team is betting on Bryant being entertaining enough to keep fans interested for the next two seasons. If Tuesday is any indication, they are going to lose that bet, and lose it big.

Harvey Araton of The New York Times: When the end was near, when Lionel Hollins could no longer continue a decades-long tradition of talking basketball with Jack Ramsay, he still made calls to him, the old coach in South Florida. A friend of Ramsay’s would answer and ask Hollins to record a message. In the last one, a day or two before Ramsay died in April at age 89 after a long struggle with cancer, Hollins got right to the point. “I love you,” he said. “You were a father figure for me, much more than a coach.” With the N.B.A. regular season upon us, let us note that Derek Fisher, the Knicks’ new coach, isn’t the only one in town extending a legacy, from Red Holzman to Phil Jackson to him. In Brooklyn, where Hollins has replaced Jason Kidd, he brings a vintage stamp, too, as a disciple of Ramsay, or Dr. Jack, a Hall of Famer who coached in the N.B.A. for 21 years.As a starter on Ramsay’s championship Portland Trail Blazers in 1977, Hollins — like Fisher, a southpaw — led a group of swift guards. Bill Walton triggered fast breaks with textbook outlet passes. Maurice Lucas provided the muscle. Ramsay’s Blazers were the old (1970s) Knicks of the Great Northwest, another quintessential unit working, it seemed, telepathically.

Dave Feschuk of the Toronto Star: If the droves of data can be daunting to digest, Alex McKechnie soon emerged with one surprising takeaway. According to the Catapult numbers captured during Raptors scrimmages, some 80 per cent of movements were performed laterally or backwards. Only 20 per cent of athletes’ collective movement was of the forward variety. McKechnie beckoned Gary McCoy, Catapult’s senior applied sports scientist, to have a look at what he’d discovered. ... The changes the Raptors have made since embracing Catapult technology aren’t merely the stuff of tech-savvy trivia. One of the underplayed stories of Toronto’s first playoff run in six years was that, along with benefitting from the Rudy Gay trade and career-best work from a handful of key pieces, the Raptors were the least-injured team in the league in 2013-14 as measured by man games lost. The previous year, when they won 34 games and finished out of the post-season for the fifth straight year, they were one of the most-injured squads. McKechnie’s understanding of the Catapult data has been credited, along with some good fortune and various other factors, as a major reason for the reversal. Along with rejigging training protocols to account for the vast amount of lateral and rearward movements, practising with the devices also allows the team to keep an eye on the overall workload being imposed on its players. That information helps coaches determine the duration and intensity of sweat sessions.