Grizzlies Not in Hibernation When Suns are Up

After two previous matchups in which the Memphis Grizzlies handled the Phoenix Suns with relative ease, it should not come to any surprise to anyone who may have missed the game and only saw the final score.

VS.

	1	2	3	4	T
Suns	27	29	29	27	112
Grizzlies	25	30	38	37	130

Playing in their final game of a brief road trip, one that will lead them home to Phoenix for their longest home stand of the season in which they will play five straight as well as eight of nine, the Suns opened tonight’s matchup with a lot of energy and grit, although the overwhelming strength of the Grizzlies eventually won the night.

The Suns have found themselves in scuffles in each of their last three games – the prior two directly associated with Marquese Chriss – tonight featuring Devin Booker and former Sun Vince Carter.

Late in the first quarter while driving to the lane, Carter was fouled by Devin Booker, though the Grizzly took offense to Book’s defense and gave him a solid elbow to the face. Whether a flop or an innocent reaction in an attempt to dodge the elbow, Book hit the deck.

The reaction from both teams cannot be given proper justice with words:

After a delay and a review, Carter was ejected, Len was awarded a technical foul, and Devin Booker received the originally called common foul.

While the game had it’s significant moments of physicality (in many ways and at many times looking a lot more like old school basketball than the new modern anti-physicality that the league has openly embraced – even Tom Chambers commented in the post-game show that the late 80s and early 90s Suns teams would have been in several fights during the game) the Grizzlies fought off the Suns’ strong first half effort with a second half that allowed them to run away with the victory.

The Suns hung onto a shallow one-point lead at halftime, but the second half was all Memphis’. Phoenix began the 3rd with a 24-second shot clock violation, to which Memphis turned into a bucket on their end. By the 9:14 mark they took a three-point lead on Marc Gasol’s fourth three-point shot of the night (one shy of his season-high), and the Grizzlies never looked back.

At the 4:01 mark the Suns remained to within a point, but from then on out a scoring barrage by the Memphis bigs put the game out of reach.

Outscoring Phoenix 50-33 over the final 16:01 as a team, Memphis bigs Zach Randalph, Marc Gasol, and Brandan Wright combined for 21 of those points.

In the end, Mike Conley didn’t set another scoring record, but the team did:

The @memgrizz scored a season-high 130 points tonight, their most in a single game since scoring 135 on January 15, 2010 vs Minnesota.
— Grizzlies PR (@GrizzliesPR) March 1, 2017

The 130 points by Memphis was the 6th time the Suns have allowed 130+ points in a game this season, the most by any team in the NBA and the most by a Suns team since the 1990-91 too allowed 130+ six times (unfortunately the 2016-17 Suns still have 22 games left). To put it into even deeper perspective, the Mike D’Antoni teams only allowed 130+ on ten occasions in four years.

Eric Bledsoe led the Suns in scoring with 20 points adding 8 assists and 5 rebounds. He added 2 steals and a block, while only turning the ball over one time. This was the 46th consecutive game that Bledsoe had scored in double-digits dating back to mid-November.

Devin Booker on the other hand had a poor shooting night and a less than exciting stat line. Scoring only 9 points, the first game since December 28 against the San Antonio Spurs that Bledsoe failed to reach double-digits, Book only shot 3-11 from the field while adding only 3 rebounds and 1 assist.

T.J. Warren had a solid shooting night scoring 17 points on 8-13 from the field, while adding 6 boards of his own. Over the three post-All-Star break games, Warren is shooting a scorching 27-39 from the field for 69.2%.

The Grizzlies were led by the three-headed monster of Mike Conley, Marc Gasol, and Zach Randolph, who combined for 80 points on 30-51 shooting from the field. They also combined for 18 rebounds and 15 assists.

Thankfully for the Suns this was the last matchup of the season against the Memphis Grizzlies. In the three-game regular season series, Memphis

More from Valley of the Suns

Swept Phoenix 3-0, the third sweep of Phoenix in the last four years

Won by an average of 118.3 – 99.6

Mike Conley recorded a career-high 38 points in the first matchup, and averaged 30 per game in the series

Conley, Gasol, and Randolph scored a combined 186 points in three games, and Randolph missed the second one.

The Grizzlies shot a combined 42-78 from beyond the arc, a mind-blowing 53.8% for a team that averages 35.4% from three on the season.

Next up the Suns embark on their longest home stand of the season beginning with the Charlotte Hornets.

Home/Suns News