On Friday night, the Memphis Grizzlies proved something that fans have known for a long time. This Grizz team can hang with the big dogs.
They came into a back-to-back against the Utah Jazz in Salt Lake City against a team that is currently on an 18-game home winning streak. The odds were against the Grizz, but this team showed that it wasn’t ready to back down.
The Grizzlies lost the game, but they showed incredible resilience throughout.
In fact, I’ll say something that I’ve said before a handful of times already. The Grizzlies were in position to beat one of the best teams in the NBA, they just didn’t end up putting it all together.
The Memphis Grizzlies showed that they can steal a game against the Utah Jazz
The tough part of this game is that the Grizzlies didn’t get into the win column. It wasn’t expected but it was hard to watch this team claw their way back into the game and take a loss.
There was, however, beauty in watching this team mount a comeback.
With just over eight minutes remaining in the game, the Grizzlies found themselves down by 17 points. Done deal, the Grizzlies can send in the subs and get ready for the next game. What are the odds that they come back from a 17-point deficit with eight minutes left against the best team in the NBA to snap Utah’s 17-game home winning streak?
Turns out, their odds were higher than we thought.
Until the bitter end, Memphis continued to fight their way back into this game. This team showed how much heart they had in this one, even if it’ll show up as another loss on their schedule.
As tweeted by the Beale Street Bears Twitter account, this may go down as the best loss in Memphis Grizzlies franchise history.
Here are some key contributors from the game:
- Ja Morant: 32 points, 11 assists
- Dillon Brooks: 22 points
- Jonas Valanciunas: 14 points, 18 rebounds
They don’t gain anything tangible from this game, but it should allow for Taylor Jenkins’ team to have newfound energy that we didn’t see until late in Friday night’s loss. Expect Memphis to come into the next two games ready to play.
If the Grizzlies can avoid an early deficit, there’s no reason that they won’t be able to steal a win in one of their two games against the Jazz in the next four days.