All of the lead-ins about the Memphis Grizzlies facing the San Antonio Spurs on Tuesday began with a mention that Tony Parker was out with an injury.
No one bothered to mention that the Grizzlies were without Rudy Gay, who suffered a shoulder injury on February 15 and will miss at least another two weeks before returning.
Despite Gay’s absence and center Marc Gasol’s ejection from the game with 5:12 remaining in the first half, Memphis dominated San Antonio in defeating the Spurs 109-93.
Memphis forced 21 turnovers and didn’t allow any of the Spurs starters to score in double figures.
The Grizzlies were up by 25 points with 9:02 left in the game and cruised to their 34th victory of the season.
If we’re to believe that Parker is so important to the Spurs success that the team with the best record in the NBA can’t beat the Grizzlies even without Gay, then San Antonio is in trouble.
Or perhaps another way to look at it is that Memphis is a pretty good team without Gay, but San Antonio is merely average without Parker.
Regardless if Parker had played Tuesday or not, Memphis would have still won the game handily. With the win, Memphis remained eighth in the Western Conference playoff chase with 20 games left in the season.
The Grizzlies are rounding into form heading into the last six weeks of the regular season and will continue to improve now that they’ve reacquired Shane Battier.
Once Gay returns from his injury Memphis will have plenty of depth, including three playoff experienced veterans in Battier, Tony Allen and Jason Williams.
The Grizzlies are also benefiting from Darrell Arthur’s increasing contributions off the bench and even seldom used Hamed Haddadi has provided solid minutes to spell Gasol.
Memphis is entering its most demanding portion of their schedule with 10 games against teams with winning records throughout the month of March.
The Grizzlies will face New Orleans on Friday at FedExForum and then travel to Dallas where they’ll face the Mavericks on Sunday.
