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Beyond the Arc Sports

First Round Game 1: Grizzlies 100, Trail Blazers 86

CREDIT: Larry Kuzniewski

Larry Kuzniewski

It’s that time of year again.

Tonight, the Grizzlies—featuring Mike Conley and Tony Allen for the first time in weeks—dropped the Portland Trail Blazers 100-86 in Game 1 of the first round of the playoffs. The Grizzlies got a combined 31 points and 22 rebounds from Zach Randolph and Marc Gasol, 16 points on 11 shots from Conley (in only 23 minutes) and, perhaps most surprisingly, 20 points on 9-14 shooting (along with 7 assists, 7 rebounds, and zero turnovers) from Beno Udrih, who has enjoyed torching Portland all season long.

For all the Grizzlies’ struggles down the stretch of the season, all the anxieties about whether anyone would be healthy enough to play, all the hand-wringing (some of it here) about what was wrong, last night’s game unfolded just like every other Grizzlies/Blazers game this season, only with a playoff-caliber (if maybe not completely full) FedExForum crowd rolling behind it.

Larry Kuzniewski

Zach Randolph and LaMarcus Aldridge battled in Game 1, in what promises to be a very physical matchup for the whole series.

Playing for home court advantage and the 4/5 matchup instead of gambling on playing the Clippers on the road turns out to have been the right decision. Portland’s matchups are clearly hampered by their injuries; without Wes Matthews and Arron Afflalo, they struggle to find scoring from anyone but Damian Lillard and LaMarcus Aldridge. When the Grizzlies’ defense forces those two into shooting a combined 18 of 55 from the field—and Lillard was also particularly bad on defense, running into Griz screens and essentially stopping right then and there—Portland is in for a long night, which means that if Afflalo can’t get healthy, they may be in for a long series.

Tonight featured some pretty spectacular Playoff Grindhouse moments, though, even as the crowd and most of Grizzlies Twitter watched the Grizziles’ lead build with more than a little unease about blowing big leads in home Game 1’s (and that’s all I’ll say about that particular 2012 waking nightmare):

  • Zach Randolph gets fouled by LaMarcus Aldridge, walks to the scorers’ table beating his chest and then motions to the crowd, which immediately starts chanting “Z-Bo.”
  • Tony Allen gets a wide open backdoor slam dunk. He does not miss.
  • After getting abused for the first ten minutes of the game, LaMarcus Aldridge finally snaps and gets a technical foul for yelling at the ref after an offensive foul is called on Chris Kaman for elbowing Marc Gasol in the face.
  • Natch the Black Bear turns heel, attacks Grizz, and dons a Portland jersey for the rest of the game, only for Super Grizz to show up later and do this:

That’s right. The loudest crowd noise of the night happened when the mascot jumped off a ladder and power slammed another mascot through a folding table. The NBA Playoffs: Where Memphis Happens.

I don’t have much in the way of “Game Notes” for this one. Gasol and Randolph were Gasol and Randolph. Mike Conley came back, and even though he told folks after the game he felt “a step slow”, he didn’t really look that way, using his hesitation move to completely baffle Damian Lillard coming off screens and using a lefty scoop shot to devastating effect. Tony Allen looked rusty early, clearly having trouble moving the way he wanted to, but by the end of the game he didn’t look to be struggling anywhere near as much. Udrih probably won’t have another game like this one, but it doesn’t matter—he’s still so effective from midrange that Portland has to pay attention to him, and his game tonight means that’s even more true.

The Chess Match

Larry Kuzniewski

Damian Lillard struggled to get anything done in Game 1, while Mike Conley played a very good game.

Both teams will make adjustments after tonight’s game. As resoundingly as the Grizzlies won, there are still things they could’ve done better—execution with the bench unit was lackluster at times, as they were clearly freestyling and waiting to see whether Beno was going to shoot or not. (Most of the time he did, and it was effective.) That’s got to tighten up a little bit going forward; Portland’s bench was never that good to begin with and with injuries pushing Afflalo into the starting lineup they’re that much weaker.

Portland has a few things they can do differently. Meyers Leonard didn’t play much tonight (only 16 minutes) but when he did, he was pretty effective at stretching Gasol out from the paint and opening up the floor a little bit. As the Blazers are going to win or lose this series on the backs of Lillard and Aldridge, anything that gets Gasol that far out from the basket gives them an advantage. The other thing, of course, is they have to figure Lillard won’t be that bad again, at least not consistently. Lillard is such a big time scorer—a guy who loves to rise to the occasion and step up for a big shot—that you can bet he’s going to use tonight’s game as bulletin board material and will do everything within his power to keep from having another 5-21 night. Batum is a scoring threat too—someone else on that team who will probably have a big game at some point in ther series.

Overall the Grizzlies’ game plan worked: pummel the Blazers inside, and force Aldridge and Lillard to carry them. It’s what the Grizzlies did to Portland every time they played in the regular season, and it’s a good way to win this series, and Portland is going to have to have someone step up and start hitting outside shots if they’re going to steal the next game.

Tweet(s) of the Night

Tim Tebow apparently signed with the Eagles tonight, which led to this:

This was surprisingly accurate:

Last but not least, someone should steal this idea and monetize it:

Up Next

Game 2 is Wednesday night, 7PM Memphis time, and will be on TNT. Given that it’s a Portland/Memphis series, I’m surprised they’re not using the D-League’s method of live YouTube broadcasts, but I’m thankful nonetheless.