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Beyond the Arc Sports

Grizzlies Bounce Back, Defeating Suns 117-96

CREDIT: Larry Kuzniewski

Uncertainty hung in the air going into Saturday night’s home game against the Phoenix Suns. After a compelling win against a scary Utah Jazz team, the Grizzlies suffered a disappointing loss in Sacramento. The Grizzlies coughed up a halftime lead when the Kings clamped down on defense and clawed their way to victory.
Larry Kuzniewski

Worse than the loss, Marc Gasol suffered what appeared at the time to be a potentially season-altering injury when De’Aaron Fox came down on Gasol’s upper back area fighting for a rebound. The good energy from the win over Utah evaporated.

Fortunately, Gasol wasn’t seriously injured after all. “It was a pretty bad scare when it happened. Thankfully, everything is okay. No structural damage or anything too serious to worry about,” he told The Daily Memphian.

Doubts remained elsewhere, however, regarding the team’s rebounding, defense, and especially with Kyle Anderson. Anderson’s length, ball-handling, and IQ portended to him quickly fitting in with the Grizzlies, but he’s struggled to find his groove.

While Anderson didn’t make much headway acclimating himself to the team in this one, the Grizzlies were able to hold their own on the boards, gobbling up 39 to the Suns’ 35. The Grizzlies performed better on defense, as well, with Ayton being the only Phoenix player to score in the 20s, but the Suns’ offensive woes were more indicative of their youth, inexperience, and lack of Devin Booker tonight.

The matchup also featured another marquee rookie matchup between number one overall pick DeAndre Ayton and fourth overall pick Jaren Jackson. With Saturday night’s game, Jackson has faced off against every top-5 draft pick except Luka Doncic.

The Grizzlies built up a sizeable lead in the first half, creating a 25-point cushion behind 61 percent shooting, including 7-13 from deep.  The high shooting percentage may speak more towards the Suns’ defense than the Grizzlies offense. The Grizzlies are currently rated last in the league in offense, and it shows. The offense frequently falls stagnant, and fails to generate good or easy looks for anyone.

Grizzlies Bounce Back, Defeating Suns 117-96

Ayton, the lauded #1 overall pick for the Phoenix Suns, didn’t impose himself at all in the first quarter. He routinely passed out of the paint despite having the physical advantage against his defender, and finished with 2 points on just one shot.
Larry Kuzniewski

Ayton turned that around, however, in the second quarter, going 6-6 and scoring 6 straight on Jaren Jackson when Gasol sat. He would finish the game with 25 points on 12-13(!) shooting, 8 rebounds, and 5 assists.

One thing that stood out in the first half was the Grizzlies’ offense not immediately going down in flames when Conley exited the game for rest. Shelvin Mack buoyed the team nicely and dished 4 assists as backup point guard, and Wayne Selden chipped in 10 points and 2 two assists.

Gasol, Conley, and Selden all finished the half in double digits, with five other Grizzlies scoring at least 5 points. Ayton was the only Suns player to finish the first half in double-digits with 14 points, with only 3 players notching at least 5 points.

Anderson continued to struggle finding his groove with the team. After starting, he got the hook with 7:46 remaining in the first quarter after missing a couple bunny shots near the rim, and going 0-3. He finished the half with 0 points on those three shots.

The Grizzlies maintained their advantage in the second half, keeping a healthy points margin over the Suns. Their solid lead late into the game allowed Yuta Watanabe to check in, and become the second Japanese player to play in the NBA in league history. Japanese NBA Twitter definitely paid attention to the moment. My two most viral tweets, by an enormous margin, were crappy handheld phone videos of Yuta dunking in the warmup line, and spinning to the hoop, missing, but drawing the foul. Virtually all of the RTs and favs were from Japanese basketball fans.

Grizzlies Bounce Back, Defeating Suns 117-96 (2)

Grizzlies Bounce Back, Defeating Suns 117-96 (3)

Jaren Jackson had a rough game defensively. He wasn’t able to deter Ayton, got into foul trouble early, and earned the first technical of his NBA career after receiving his 5th personal foul. It’s funny that his offense has come along more quickly than his defense.

Grizzlies Bounce Back, Defeating Suns 117-96 (4)

Garrett Temple has absolutely locked down the starting shooting guard spot. His defense has been crucial, his ball handling on point, and he finished the game with 15 points on 4-6 shooting. It appears to be for the best, as Dillon Brooks gets to come off the bench with more freedom to impose his will as a dynamic playmaker. Brooks actually ended up playing about four more minutes than Temple, but that’s partially indicative of the Grizzlies comfortable lead for most of the game.
Larry Kuzniewski

The Grizzlies bench contributed nicely in this win. Wayne Selden continued to impress. He finished with 16 points on 6-8 shooting, and provided a nice punch at the two spot. Marshon Brooks played his role perfectly as instant offense off the bench, pouring in 18 points in 19 minutes. Larry Kuzniewski

Gasol didn’t look limited in his return to action. He finished with 19 points on 8-16 shooting, and hit 3-6 from deep (including a Steph-range near buzzer-beater to end the first half). Larry Kuzniewski

Mike Conley had a solid game without having to soak up super-heavy minutes. He scored 11 points and tallied 7 assists in 28 minutes. Usually when Conley leaves the game to rest, the Grizzlies offense goes down in flames. Garrett Temple and especially Shelvin Mack were able to buoy the offense when Conley exited, and to not immediately enter a tailspin without Conley is a new development.

When I asked Conley what it’s meant to be able to go to the bench and the offense stay afloat, he said Mack, Temple, and Anderson have been huge. “[It] allows me to keep fresh legs longer.” He also noted that their play will allow him to regain his conditioning with each game as he returns to pre-injury form. J.B. Bickerstaff understood the importance of being cautious with how much the Grizzlies lean on Conley, saying “I feel bad because there’s been times where it feels like we’re wearing him down, so we’ve got to do a better job of giving him some breaks.”

The Grizzlies are now 3-2 on the season, and return to action on Tuesday when they take on the Washington Wizards at FedExForum.

Epilogue: the Grizzlies blared Kid Rock’s Bawitdaba to pump up the crowd late in the fourth, and I’ve never seen less of a reaction. Let us pray that this trash song gets retired and forgotten sooner rather than later.

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Beyond the Arc Sports

Suns 96, Grizzlies 90 — This Defeat Was No Orphan

CREDIT: LARRY KUZNIEWSKI

Jerryd Bayless scored a season-high 29, but it wasnt enough in a game where so much went wrong.

  • LARRY KUZNIEWSKI
  • Jerryd Bayless scored a season-high 29, but it wasn’t enough in a game where so much went wrong.

After two days of practice to get a feel for their new players, the Grizzlies debuted a new starting lineup and still-evolving new rotation Tuesday night and ended up with perhaps their worst loss of the season, though I think the causal link between those two things is limited.

It’s said that victory has a thousand fathers but defeat’s an orphan. Not here. Zach Randolph, in the midst of an encouraging 21-13 bounce-back game, getting only one fourth quarter shot?

“I’ll take the blame for that,” Lionel Hollins said.

Marc Gasol fouling out in only 23 minutes and probably playing his worst two-way game of the season?

“It sucks, but it happens. This one’s on me,” Gasol said, dismissing the notion that the roster changes were to blame,

The fourth quarter, in which the Suns outscored the Grizzlies 31-19 to complete a come-from-behind victory, was a perfect storm of things going wrong for the Grizzlies:

Randolph didn’t get the ball, and wasn’t happy about it after the game.

The Grizzlies had more turnovers (7) than made field goals (5), and some of those turnovers were inexplicable, entirely unforced errors.

Phoenix point guard Goran Dragic, who’s often proved a tricky match-up for Mike Conley, got rolling, scoring 15 points on 5-6 shooting in the quarter, including a deja vu spinning lay-up when it seemed like the Suns were on the verge of a shot-clock violation.

And the Grizzlies had a head-scratcher of a late possession. Down four with the ball and 32 seconds to play, the Grizzlies came out of a timeout and, when they failed to get a good shot in the first few seconds after the in-bounds, settled for a rushed Darrell Arthur three-point attempt. An early shot would have been preferable given the shot-clock/game-clock margin, but a good shot was necessary.

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Beyond the Arc Sports

Game Preview: Grizzlies at Suns

The Grizzlies are likely to see less of Michael Beasley in this rematch with the Phoenix Suns.

  • The Grizzlies are likely to see less of Michael Beasley in this rematch with the Phoenix Suns.

First off, apologies for this blog’s recent relative dormancy. I was out of town last weekend for a birthday trip and returned to a Grizzlies situation in which three off days preceded a road trip that begins tonight, and a work situation in which the voting deadline for the film critics group to which I belong looms at the end of the week. So I’ve been in movie mode.

Posting will be modest the rest of this week, but I hope to have the blog back at full throttle next week when the Grizzlies return to FedExForum for a three-game homestand.

With the Grizzlies facing a Suns team they beat in overtime just last week, I’m not going to do a typical match-ups-oriented preview. Instead, a few bullet-point notes and observations on tonight’s game and where the Grizzlies stand at the moment:

*The West is looking as tough as ever. Just a few days ago, the Grizzlies (14-4) had the best record in the NBA. Now they have the third best record in the conference behind the Spurs (18-4 on a five-game winning streak) and Thunder (17-4 on an eight-game winning streak) and just barely ahead of the Clippers (15-6 on a seven-game winning streak) and the surprising Warriors (14-7 on a four-game winning streak). Despite the Grizzlies great start, no-one should assume an ultimate improvement on last season’s fourth-place finish. This will likely be a tough, close playoff race all season.

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Beyond the Arc Sports

Postgame Notebook: Grizzlies 108, Suns 98 — Z-Bo Pushes That Boulder to the Top of the Hill

CREDIT: Getty Images

Z-Bo: Man of the Match, and then some.

The Lead: The word of the game: Sisyphean.

The Grizzlies entered the night as the only team in the NBA without a legitimate “bad” loss, but for most of this one it sure felt like the Suns were going to hand them one.

A disastrous first quarter-and-a-half featuring 12 Grizzlies turnovers put the home team in a 16-point hole, their biggest deficit of the season. But, with Tony Allen missing the game, Quincy Pondexter and Darrell Arthur came off the bench to ignite the Grizzlies defense and pick up the team’s energy, spurring a 16-4 run that pulled the Grizzlies to within a couple of buckets.

But every time the Grizzlies would get the boulder near the top of the hill, it would roll back down. On eight different occasions between the late second quarter and late fourth quarter, the Grizzlies cut the Suns lead to four or less only to have the Suns answer with a basket. A Shannon Brown drive. A Markieff Morris three. A Luis Scola jumper. A Goran Dragic bank shot. A Dragic three. A Marcin Gortat jumper. A Jared Dudley three. A Jermaine O’Neal jumper. Answers coming from everywhere.

It’s common in NBA games for teams to expend so much energy coming back from a big deficit that they run out of gas before they can cross the finish line, and this one sure felt that way. But a three-foot Zach Randolph runner with 1:30 left in regulation finally pushed the boulder on top of the hill, if only for a minute. And a short Rudy Gay jumper with the shot-clock off and a subsequent defensive stop sent it to overtime. And that’s when Zach Randolph — magnificent all night — planted that damn rock.