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Spurs at Grizzlies: 8pm Central ESPN
Desperation time for the Grizzlies as the Spurs outplayed them for seven quarters in San Antonio before they made a furious rally in the 4th quarter of game two only to fall short in overtime.
The Spurs have controlled the Grizzlies in the paint by ganging up on Zach Randolph and daring the Grizz to be shooters; San Antonio's relative prowess from beyond the arc has been a huge factor in this series. They have made 23 three pointers to Memphis' ten. That isn't an unusually low number of makes for this Memphis team, but they have to get better production from their bigs if their non-reliance on the three is going to continue to be successful.
The Grizzlies were able to get game two to overtime despite shooting 34% from the field by dominating the offensive glass to the tune of 19-4. This was one of their signatures all season long, and they will have to continue to pound the glass to get back into this series.
This one isn't over. A year ago, the Spurs looked unbeatable for months culminating in their 2-0 lead over Oklahoma City in the Western Conference Finals. They didn't win again. Memphis is entirely capable of evening up this series on their home floor, but they have to take care of business tonight. We'll see if they can live up to their Z-Bo inspired theme song:
We have a fantastic series going on in the Eastern Conference, hopefully Memphis and San Antonio can bring us more of the same in the West.
Talk about it here.