Tag: Wayne Ellington

Categories
Beyond the Arc Sports

Countdown: The 2012-2013 Season’s Top Ten Moments

I wanted to put this up in the meager time between the end of the regular season and the beginning of the playoffs, but was too bogged down. With a two-day break before Friday’s Game 6 and coming off a rousing win last night in Los Angeles, let’s take a moment to remember some of the high points of what was an eventful and thoroughly enjoyable regular season. I’ll return with a Game 6 preview on Friday morning. Let me know what I missed:

10. DPOY:
Not a “moment,” but I couldn’t find a clip of Tony Allen’s extraordinary defense late in that home loss to the Pacers, which I wanted to use. So I’ll lead off with this, Gasol adding to a Grizzlies’ trophy case that already included a Rookie of the Year, Coach of the Year, and Sixth Man of the Year award.

9. Rudy Tracks it Down, and Throws it Down (vs. Spurs, Friday, January 11th)
Rudy Gay’s massive contract and middling production necessitated a trade, and the Grizzlies have been better as a result. But that doesn’t mean he didn’t have more than his share of great moments. The best this season came in what I still think was the (regular) season’s best game, a home overtime win over the Spurs.

Categories
Beyond the Arc Sports

Early Offense — A more diversified attack has the Grizzlies looking like a contender.

CREDIT: LARRY KUZNIEWSKI

Mike Conley has been the engine driving the Grizzlies offensive improvement.

  • LARRY KUZNIEWSKI
  • Mike Conley has been the engine driving the Grizzlies’ offensive improvement.

Even before Sunday night’s spectacular blowout of the defending NBA champion Miami Heat moved the Grizzlies to 5-1 and cemented the best start in franchise history, the boys in Beale Street Blue were already showing signs of being a potentially elite team.

What was true before the opening tip on Sunday remained true when the final buzzer sounded: The Grizzlies were one of only two NBA teams — along with defending Western Conference champs and follow-up opponents the Oklahoma City Thunder — to rank among the league’s 10 best in offense, defense, and rebounding.

The rebounding is not a mystery. The return of Zach Randolph, who currently leads the league at 14.5 boards a game, has pretty well taken care of that. Neither is the defense, which has been a constant since the Grizzlies put Tony Allen and Marc Gasol on the floor together two seasons ago.

But the offensive improvement — way up, from 20th to 9th, per possession — is a little more surprising, especially with each of the team’s frontcourt stars — Randolph, Gasol, and leading scorer Rudy Gay — starting the season shooting below their career averages, and with last season’s top bench scorer, O.J. Mayo, enjoying a bit of a rebirth with the Dallas Mavericks. Rather than individual dominance, a lot of small team factors have conspired to make this year’s Griz squad deeper, more dynamic, and more efficient on the offensive end of the floor.

Categories
Beyond the Arc Sports

Road Recap: Grizzlies 108, Bucks 90

CREDIT: LARRY KUZNIEWSKI

Jerryd Bayless has rebounded from his pre-season shooting struggles.

  • LARRY KUZNIEWSKI
  • Jerryd Bayless has rebounded from his pre-season shooting struggles.

The Grizzlies improved to 3-1 on the season with a third consecutive commanding win over a team with legitimate playoff aspirations. Marc Gasol continued his versatile, efficient excellence (14 points, 9 rebounds, 5 assists on only 8 field-goal attempts). Zach Randolph continued to dominate on the boards (a game-high 13; he leads the league with a 15.3 average). Rudy Gay continued to find lots of shots (20) without quite connecting on enough of them (7).

But the real story last night was the performance of the Grizzlies’ bench. Marreese Speights went off for 18 points and 9 rebounds in only 22 minutes, while the perimeter trio of Jerryd Bayless, Wayne Ellington, and Quincy Pondexter combined to shoot 6-9 from long-range. Bayless has hit a three-pointer in every game so far (50% overall), which is encouraging after his poor shooting in the preseason. Assuming Pondexter’s development into a viable three-point shooter was one of the reasons I projected the Grizzlies to be a slightly better overall three-point shooting team even after losing O.J. Mayo, and the early returns are good, as he’s 5-9 from long-range through four games. Ellington hasn’t quite found his groove yet (3-9), but his sufficient defense and overall strong effort level has made him a general plus as a deep reserve.

The cherry on top of this one was three uneventful garbage-time debut minutes for rookie Tony Wroten Jr.

Categories
Beyond the Arc Sports

Clippers 101, Grizzlies 92 — Something We’ve Seen Before

CREDIT: LARRY KUZNIEWSKI

Conley.jpg

The Grizzlies fell to the Los Angeles Clippers last night in a regular-season debut that felt frustratingly familiar.

For starters, it was the Grizzlies 12th consecutive opening-night loss, the longest current streak in any of the four major team sports, according to the Elias Sports Bureau.

Secondly, the game felt very much like a continuation of this spring’s playoff series between the two teams: It was an intense, physical, closely fought game decided by a big disparity in bench production and fourth-quarter execution.

The Grizzlies four-man bench unit was outscored 49-17, with the Clippers getting a game-high 29 points from new addition Jamal Crawford and bruising, efficient play from Eric Bledsoe (13-4-4 in 17 minutes). Meanwhile, the Grizzlies perimeter reserves Jerryd Bayless, Wayne Ellington, and Quincy Pondexter combined to shoot 3-17. As a team, the Grizzlies shot only 2-14 from three-point range.

Bench production and team-wide three-point shooting are big questions facing the Grizzlies this season, and the team will have to get more in both areas than they got in Game 1 to have a successful season. But, those issues aside, there wasn’t much here to get too worked up about yet.