Grizzlies Start Hot, Aaron Brooks Gets Hotter, Rockets Win 107-94

by djturtleface on Mar 17, 2010 10:45 PM CDT Comment 4 comments

If the Grizzlies got to pick one quarter to throw out at the end of every game, they'd probably be playing much, much better than they have been lately.

Tonight it was the 3rd, not an uncommon time for the Grizz to slump, when Memphis didn't convert a field goal for nearly half the quarter. It literally took until the 6:05 mark for Zach Randolph to flip in a bucket.

The Rocket's perimeter defense is obviously good with Shane Battier and Trevor Ariza, but tonight it was spectacular. Rudy Gay scored just 14 and Mike Conley only added 11 of his own. O.J. Mayo had one of the worst nights of his career, shut down for just 4 points on 1-6 shooting.

Aaron Brooks was the hero for the Rockets, not that they needed one, scoring 31 on just 14 shots from the field. He dropped in all 7 three-pointers that he shot and was just spectacular overall. Luis Scola also saw a lot of looks, scoring 20, and Kevin Martin also played well.

Overall an extremely tough loss to swallow. They're now 0-3 against Houston on the season, half a game behind them in the Western Conference, and look beat up and tired. The last time the playoffs looked this distant, we were 1-8 and talking about what to do with Allen Iverson.

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I'm not sure it's all that bad for Memphis.

The thing that I see happening in our matchups is that Houston has two very fine wing defenders in Battier and Ariza. So Zach Randolph goes crazy against Hayes (not as much against Hill, interestingly) but if Gay and Mayo only get you 18, it’s going to be tough to overcome Houston’s scoring.

Why all the hate for Thabeet? He looked good to me, young, but good. Was he really that terrible early on?

Significant gravitas shortfall expected in 2010.

The Dreamshake

by Xiane on Mar 18, 2010 12:09 AM CDT reply actions

As far as the Thabeet goes...

He might have been tremendously horrible or just as good as now; there’s lots of factors involved. He’s been solid lately, though.

As far as how bad it is, it definitely sucks to roll into a divisional opponent’s house and get smoked like that, especially when it mean them passing you in the standings. And on top of that it’s clear that the Rockets are just a terrible matchup for us…

Straight Outta Vancouver - The Memphis Grizzlies DO Still Exist

by djturtleface on Mar 18, 2010 8:41 AM CDT up reply actions

Matchup problems

Aaron Brooks is definitely a matchup problem for us, but he is for most teams, I think. Conley could not stay with him if his life depended on it.

Still, you’d think that we’d create more matchup problems for them down low. With Marc Gasol in there, we could have beat up their front line a little more than we did, i think. Maybe we could have made Scola work harder on defense. Zach is a tough matchup for Hayes, obviously, and the lack of a bunch of 7 footers could have been great for us if we could figure out how to take advantage of it more. That lob to Haddadi where he just caught it over the defender’s head and laid it in plus the foul is something I’d like to see more of – with both him and Thabeet.

by hueyproductions on Mar 18, 2010 9:31 AM CDT reply actions