MIAMI (AP) – Try to picture this: Dirk Nowitzki, wearing sandals, headphones and slathered from head-to-toe in suntan lotion, strolling along a tropical beach whistling along to his favorite David Hasselhoff tune.

Some sight, huh?

Well, that’s the way Dallas coach Avery Johnson sees his Mavericks at this point, tied at 2-2 in the NBA finals.

“We’re on vacation right now,” a playful-yet-stern Johnson said. “We’ve got a vacation mentality, so I’m going to fix that.”

He’d better do something fast, and Johnson will have to make plans for Sunday’s Game 5 without forward Jerry Stackhouse, suspended Friday for one game without pay for his flagrant foul on Shaquille O’Neal in Game 4.

During much of their short stay in hazy and humid South Florida, the Mavericks have looked like tourists – lost ones.

Once barely six minutes from taking a 3-0 lead, Dallas is now in danger of falling behind in a series that it seemed to own. Unable to stop or slow Miami guard Dwyane Wade, the Mavericks have allowed the Heat to pull even in this best-of-seven series, now on hold until Sunday.

After Game 2, the Mavericks departed Texas brimming with confidence following another easy win in their inaugural visit to the finals. Dallas officials even had the audacity to plan the championship parade, going so far as to announce the route through the downtown city streets.

That party’s been put on hold.

As if blowing a 13-point lead in the fourth quarter of Game 3 wasn’t bad enough, the Mavericks bottomed out late Thursday night. Down by 11 entering the final period, they scored just seven points – the fewest in a quarter in finals history – on 2-for-18 (11 percent) shooting.

“We’re very disappointed with the way we’ve played,” Johnson said during a lively 30-minute interview session that at times seemed to be aimed directly at his sluggish squad. “We’ve been distracted. We’ve not had the right type of focus or the right type of physicality, but that can come back.”

For Dallas to reverse its sudden slide, Nowitzki needs to find his jump shot following a 2-for-14 performance. It would be nice if Josh Howard, too, could find his range after a 1-for-8 night that contributed to the Mavericks setting a franchise playoff record by shooting 31 percent.

And now they’ll have to play without Stackhouse, their versatile sixth man, penalized by the NBA for “making unnecessary and excessive contact” with O’Neal, who was sent sprawling to the floor by Stackhouse’s head-high forearm shiver.

Before learning of the penalty, Johnson defended Stackhouse’s rough play, insisting it was nothing more than a hard foul leveled at the game’s biggest player.

“Shaq was just in an awkward position,” he said. “I always talk to them (his players) about giving hard fouls. But we definitely don’t want to injure players. That’s not in my repertoire. Never will be as a coach.”

Johnson pointed to O’Neal clocking Stackhouse in the nose, causing a nasty gash that needed stitches to close, in Game 1 as evidence that there should be no further punishment to his player.

“Shaq practically broke his nose. But was that a flagrant foul? No,” Johnson said. “I don’t know if it’s a suspension. I don’t have control over that, that’s not our job but I don’t think it’s a suspension.”

Later, after learning of the ban on Stackhouse, Johnson had a much different tone.

“It’s just a bunch of baloney,” he said on his weekly radio show with Dallas’ 103.3 ESPN. “For lack of a better word, it’s sickening. Our fans should be upset, our players will be.”

Johnson said team owner Mark Cuban was “humiliated.” Cuban did not immediately return an e-mail to The Associated Press seeking comment.

Losing Stackhouse will be damaging, though not devastating to the Mavericks, whose bench is among the league’s deepest. Stackhouse, however, gives Dallas an intensity that Johnson feels has been missing for two games.

Johnson, ever mindful of sending his team the right message, dismissed the idea that the Mavericks were matching Miami’s physical toughness.

“No, it’s been one-sided,” he said. “It’s not with the team from Texas.”

Of all Dallas’ problems, Wade is at the top of the list. In fact, the 24-year-old shooting star might be Nos. 1 through 5.

Doing almost anything he’s pleased with the ball in his hands, Wade has blistered the Mavericks for 78 points in the past two games, getting 36 in Game 4 on a sore left knee that will be closer to 100 percent by Sunday.

Riley has been impressed by the way Wade, playing in his first finals, has adapted to the various defenses the Mavericks have thrown at him.

“He had two difficult games in Dallas,” Riley said of Wade, who was a combined 17-of-44 in Games 1 and 2. “He was driving incessantly to the rim, getting a lot of layups, getting contested on a lot of layups and I thought he was going at 100 miles per hour or faster.

“He had to slow down, relax and see the game better and I think he’s done that, he said. “I think he’s just taken a good look at the game as it’s being played and not rushing things.”

Johnson’s in a hurry to figure out how to stop Wade from slashing, scoring, falling, getting up and doing it all again. Wade’s averaging 32.3 points and at least a handful of jaw-dropping moments per game in the series.

“When we’ve tried to contain him one-on-one, he’s gotten around us,” Johnson said, his high-pitched voice rising. “When we’ve tried to quick trap him, he split the quick traps. When we’ve tried to slow trap him, he’s spun out.

“So I’m just going to try to come up with another type of defense, or maybe at some point, somebody will get angry enough on our team and we’ll guard him a little bit stronger and not let him split the trap.”

Seated at a podium in front of reporters at the time, Johnson may as well have been standing in Dallas’ locker room addressing players he feels aren’t focused at the season’s most crucial point.

He wasn’t happy, and he wasn’t finished.

“And we’ve zoned him, too,” he said. “That didn’t go well, either.”

For Dallas, nothing is right now.

AP-ES-06-16-06 1915EDT