The Memphis Grizzlies tied their second-round streak with the Golden State Warriors in a game with a 106-101 victory in Game 2 on Tuesday. Morant led all scorers to a record 47 points in his playoffs, joining LeBron James and Kobe Bryant as the only players in history to record several playoffs with 45 points before the age of 23, according to ESPN statistics.
Stephen Curry led the Golden State with 27 points on a night in which the Memphis defense supported the Warriors to just 18.4 percent of a 3-point shot. Jordan Poole added 20 points in the loss. Game 3 is scheduled for Saturday in San Francisco.
Here are three excerpts from the Memphis victory with a draw.
1. I-dropper
Ian Eagle has presented almost all Ja puns you can think of during this series, so we can continue here. Morant is amazing. As mentioned at the top, his 47 points put him on the list with Kobe Bryant and LeBron James as the only players in history to post numerous playoff games of 45 points before the age of 23.
Morant caught a break early when Gary Peyton II was lost for the match after a rough foul 2 with the kind assistance of Dylan Brooks, who was sent off. Peyton – who Steve Kerr reported after the match had an elbow fracture, which is terrible news – is a threat to the ball and after he came out, Morant had auspicious matches all night. He takes full advantage of the distortion of the paint and completes the typical acrobatic and powerful way.
Morant, who brought the Grizzlies home with 18 points from the fourth quarter, was ultra-aggressive, firing 31 shots, 12 of which were beyond the arc. The Warriors relaxed away from him at the top and he entered the 3s all night, making five of them. If he starts hitting this blow consistently, which is not excluded in this type of space, it will be officially impossible to defend. It may already be.
2. Brick Brothers
Curry and Clay Thompson combined 5 for 23 out of 3 and 16 for 44 overall. Most of them were good looking, some completely open. Curry had one wide-eyed look late in the game, which missed everything, and even one of the 3s he made, a dead straight hit when entering from the top of the key, was a brick on the dashboard that had just entered.
This continues to be a confusing shooting season for Curry, who is now 27 against 70 from deep in the playoffs (38 percent). This is not a bad number, unless you are Curry, who this season has been nothing close to the shooter who has been throughout his career. It is an unstable gameplay and very rarely hits crazy punches. You can find out how locked the shooter is by his shortcomings – are they short or long, a better sign or missing left and right? – and Curry, who is 8 to 23 of the deep in the first games of this series, missed this season worse than at any time I remember.
Thompson, meanwhile, was 2 for 12 of Tuesday’s deep and is 5 for 22 for the series. His case is less suspicious; he is still less than four months old after returning from a two-year break with a torn ACL and a torn Achilles tendon. However, he has to master some of his ways without a conscience, especially outside the dribble, which is not his strength. He tried too hard to make his way to the beat on Tuesday and turned out to shoot the Warriors into a deeper hole.
There will be a lot of talk about the Warriors’ 18 turnovers in Game 2 and their inability or unwillingness to appreciate the ball in general, but this team has always been reckless (careless) downright stupid with the ball. The difference now is that they can’t get out of trouble all the time, because Curry and Thompson just aren’t the shooters they were before, or at least weren’t this season.
3. Peyton’s news is a huge mistake
To find out that Peyton has an elbow fracture is a real blow. The man bounced forever, trying to find a stable job in the NBA, and not only did he find one with the Warriors, he started the first two games of this series and was an integral part of the title contender. This changes the complexion of this series many times. Peyton was Morant’s No. 1 defender. If the Warriors had to reach the conference finals and face the Suns, you would see a lot of Peyton of Chris Paul and Devin Booker. That was his moment.
And Dylan Brooks took it away from him. Steve Kerr called it a dirty game, and I agree. No one is saying that Brooks was trying to hurt Peyton, but he made a reckless game with a man who was in the air fully aware that this put Peyton in an extremely vulnerable position. This is dirty.
All we can hope for Peyton is that he is recovering from this and this will not affect his free agency this summer. This is not a man who has made tens of millions of dollars. Again, this is the first permanent job in the NBA he has had. This summer he would sign the first financially secure contract of his life. We hope that he will still receive the salary he earned, but you just do not know the burden at the moment.
As for the Warriors, the loss of Payton is a big hit. Its protection, cutting and finishing and overall energy are a huge part of what Warriors do. We hope that Andre Iguodala can return to take on some of these best tasks on the perimeter, but there is no substitute for Peyton and what he brought at both ends. There is simply no way around this.
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