Memphis Grizzlies Beat the Pale Golden State Warriors, 110-102

The Memphis Grizzlies defeated the Golden State Warriors 110-102 tonight, inflicting Steve Kerr’s team their 20th loss of the season. It was another frustrating performance of the hosts, who struggled with shooting from the field, especially for two points.

“We (expletive) around with the game. We’re not good enough to do that,” Draymond Green was furious at the press conference.

Except for leading 4-2 at the start of the event, the hosts were always behind the Grizzlies who were confident in this one. Even in the moments when Warriors came close, there was no panic, but instead, the guests routinely denied their runs.

“One of our more complete games of the season, 48 minutes of great competitiveness, activity,” Taylor Jenkins described his Grizzlies performance tonight. “Really proud of the guys, bouncing back after a couple of tough losses.”

Particularly good was Ja Morant, who ended the night with 26 points, and was unstoppable for the home team’s defense. The No.2 pick from this draft dominated the floor, although he spent just 26 minutes playing.

Golden State allowed a 17-5 surge early on, which gave the guests a double-digit lead and boosted their morale. However, Dub Nation came back in the second, cutting the distance to only two points following D’Angelo Russell’s three-pointer with 3:53 until the end of the same, 42-40. But almost immediately, the Grizzlies responded with a 12-2 series, which brought them back to a safe distance.

Then again, the same scenario happened in the third period, with the Warriors coming awfully close to reaching Memphis and following with a huge burst of the visitors. This time it was 66-65, and two and a half minutes later 79-66.

It was the last time Kerr’s guys managed to make this contest interesting, with the Grizzlies routinely guarding their lead until the end and posting the 7th win of the season.

The Warriors posted just 37.5% shooting from the field, while on the other side allowed 50% to the guests. Also, one other aspect of the game went in Memphis favor, and that is the fast break points. The team from Tennessee had 25, while Warriors posted just 10. Apart from that, the teams were relatively similar when looking at the numbers.

Morant added 7 assists besides 26 points and was shooting 8 for 14 from the field. Jaren Jackson Jr. ended the night with 16 buckets, but shooting threes 2 for 9. Dillon Brooks had 17, while Grayson Allen came in off the bench and poured 15 missing just two of his 8 FG attempts.

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— Bally Sports: Grizzlies (@GrizzOnBally) December 10, 2019

On the other side, D’Angelo Russell and Alec Burks had a team-high with 18 points. However, Russell took many more shots to reach that number than his teammate. D-Lo made 6 of his 22 attempts, assisting 7 times. Burks was 4 from 9, making all of his 8 free throws tries and adding 7 boards and 6 assists.

Draymond Greed scored 16, while Willie Cauley-Stein had 17 points.

Kerr spoke very positively about the way the fans are still giving support to his team although things aren’t working well at the moment.

“We ahve such a great fans here. They are dying to cheer for us,” Kerr stated. “The fans are coming in and supporting us. So we got to give them something to cheer about, and I think tonight we didn’t responded well enough to do that.”

The situation for Golden State (5-20) is not good at all, and the reigning West champions are at the bottom of the conference. They are hosting the New York Knicks this Wednesday, the worst team of the East, and have a chance to improve their unexpectedly poor record. After that, GSW travels to Utah to meet the Jazz on Friday.

As for the Grizzlies (7-16), the next stop is Phoenix and the Suns also on Wednesday.