Memphis 88, San Antonio 95  //  49-10  //  1st in the West

Oh my, was that a game. Too much to digest, so let’s go bullet format:

–The Grizzles sure give us fits on the offensive glass. Mostly Zach Randolph, but Gasol is a fine offensive rebounder, as are some of their smaller players. In December’s contest (that we won in OT) they got 16 offensive boards to our 32 defensive, meaning for every 2 boards we got, they got 1. Not a good ratio. Luckily, in that game, it only resulted in 9 extra shots. Tonight they got 17 offensive rebounds to our 34 defensive, the exact same ratio. However, tonight they got 88 shots to our 65, 23 more attempts. That’s not good.

–Tony Parker showed his worth in absentia in the 2nd half, as our offense completely fell apart in the 3rd quarter with Hill as the primary PG. Hill is a wonderful 6th man and in between guard, but he’s still not ready to be a full-time starting PG, and may never be.

–To that end, we relied heavily on Ginobili in the 2nd half (particularly the 4th quarter), and he more or less won the game for us, either by driving and making the basket himself, or creating the wide open 3 for somebody else.

–Speaking of 3s…the “gimmick” shot sure got us back in the ball game bridging the 3rd and 4th quarter when it looked like all hope was lost.

–The Grizzlies played really well tonight, and they will be a nightmare match-up in the playoffs. They currently sit in the 8th spot, matched up with us. But with the recent losses to Utah and Denver, I think that they’ll move up to the 6th or 7th spot. Have fun, Los Angeles or Dallas.

–With a ref going down with torn cartilage in his knee, most of the game was officiated by just 2 refs, which led to a really disjointed game. They were letting a lot of physical play go underneath the basket, especially on missed shots/rebounds. But they also seemed to be calling lots of smaller transgressions in other areas. The flow of the game was really herky jerky.

–It really was a war of attrition, as we were already playing without Neal (could have used his offense tonight) and Splitter (and his size), we lost Parker to a calf injury, and both Blair and Duncan left the game with mild maladies (though both played again). Let’s hope the Parker injury is nothing too serious.

–Great little piece this weekend about Blair looking up to Zach Randolph. There are worse players he could model his game after. They share a similar body and playing style and affinity for grabbing rebounds. Randolph has a pretty nice shooting range and a more refined post game that it’d be great to see Blair develop.

–With the win, the Spurs set the single season home winning streak at 21. Not a moment too soon, with the next home games against the Heat and the Lakers.

–First up, though, is another game with the Grizzlies on Tuesday in Memphis. A little mini-taste of playoff basketball. Expect another tough game.