The Golden State Warriors were at Fedex Forum tonight to face the Memphis Grizzlies in a highly anticipated matchup of the two teams with the best records in the NBA.
Andrew Bogut and David Lee were once again out for the Warriors, facing a formidable Grizzlies frontline of Marc Gasol and Zach Randolph. Harrison Barnes wore a mask to protect his broken nose suffered Sunday night in the win against the Pelicans.
1ST QUARTER: Behold The Masked Black Falcon
Both teams punched and counter-punched early in the game, as Gasol and Randolph got buckets inside while Stephen Curry started out better than his counterpart, Mike Conley.
Festus Ezeli scored the Warriors with a turnaround right-handed jump-hook from the low block, which was an early promising indicator, but he didn’t get many touches after that. Klay Thompson scored a three-pointer as his head coach Steve Kerr wanted to call timeout in a stalemate game, and laughed as the shot went through and the Grizzlies came down on their next possession.
Curry got a tough high-arcing layup to go over Gasol, while Harrison Barnes got cooking early with a dunk inside after a Curry miss. It was 14-13, Memphis, with 5:16 to go at the first timeout.
Marreese Speights checked in and immediately got going as Draymond Green got an offensive rebound and dished to Spoeights from about twenty feet, straight on.
Again, both teams traded jabs as Curry turned the corner on Conley for a beautiful layup, Randolph sealed Green and made a reverse layup from the right baseline to the left, and Green later drew a charge on a shoulder-dipped Gasol. With 2:55 to play the Grizzlies still held a 20-19 lead.
Barnes then ended the quarter with a flurry as he drilled a corner three from the left side following a Gasol miss and an Andre Iguodala track-down of the rebound, plus leading of the in-transition.
Iguodala then got another rebound as Jon Leuer missed from point blank, so did Gasol on the putback, and the ball rolled on the rim to Iguodala, who pushed the ball forward and found Shaun Livingston without any rim protection for a dunk.
Barnes then drove past Leuer and issued a series of pump fakes after terminating the dribble, then went up strong for two. With the game clock winding down, Barnes found himself with the ball on the right elbow, made a couple of jab fakes and drove in for a runner at the buzzer, to give the Warriors a 30-24 lead heading into the 2nd frame.
Barnes led the Warriors with 9 points.
2ND QUARTER: Stuck In Neutral
Thompson started the second frame getting blocked by Kosta Koufos and that was the first of a huge uphill struggle for the Warriors. Leuer ran the floor and backup point guard Beno Udrih delivered the early offense pass for an and-one for Leuer.
Leuer followed that up with a jumper, then Vince Carter got in on the assault with a three-pointer. Starting the quarter with five bench players, the Grizzlies reeled off a 13-0 run and all of a sudden the Warriors found themselves down 37-30 with 9:28 to go.
Speights and Livingston would miss more shots while Koufos hit a jumper and Udrih got a finger roll, and the 13-0 run soon became 20-0. The Warriors were down 44-30 with 7:02 to go and Golden State head coach Steve Kerr put Curry back in. Speights drove hard into the paint with the left hand and finally broke the Warriors dought.
The #SplashBrothers did their best to get the Dubs back into the game. Curry got a drive to the hole off of high pick-and-roll action with Green, then Curry put his body into Koufos at the rim to create space for the layup with his left hand. Memphis head coach Dave Joerger didn’t like the momentum shift and called timeout with the Grizzlies up, 44-34, with 6:06 to go.
Thompson then carried the Dubs with a trey and-one on Conley and then another three-pointer, after a weird sequence in which Klay turned the ball over but stole it back on the other end when a pass to Koufos on the far left wing was left unattended. Thompson had gotten the ball up to Curry, who slinged it left-handed to a cutting Speights for a dunk.
But Conley got an and-one on Ezeli as Curry fell down, to close the half with a 57-49 margin for Memphis.
Thompson led the Warriors with 14 points, Curry added 10 points and 4 assists, Speights tallied 10 points and 5 rebounds, while Barnes collected 9 points and 4 rebounds. Gasol led the Grizzlies with 14 points and 4 rebounds.
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