Hustle Go Cold in Winter Showcase, Fall to Vipers Once Again

The Memphis Hustle resumed action in the NBA G League Winter Showcase on Monday afternoon as they took on a very familiar Rio Grande Valley Vipers team, a unit that they had split their series with prior to Monday’s matchup, 1-1. The squad was re-joined by forward Jake Laravia, who was assigned back to the Hustle as a result of Grizzlies superstar Ja Morant making his long-awaited return to the official Memphis Grizzlies roster. The squad will also be moving forward without center Kenneth “Junior” Lofton Jr. as he was waived by the Memphis Grizzlies as a result of Morant’s return as well. As a result, Lofton is now ineligible to appear in contests for both the Grizzlies and Hustle.

The squad out of Southaven started the Monday night matchup clawing from behind as soon as the gates opened, trailing by double-digits by the time the first quarter was winding to a close. The Hustle would ultimately trail by as many as 19 points in the first half, going into the break behind by 16.

In Hustle fashion, they showed up in the second half after a disastrous first. The Hustle continue to have issues consistently producing results between halves; it’s either start hot and go frigid or start frigid and get hot… and it’s never enough to propel the team to victory. The Hustle outscored and outplayed the Vipers through the second half; they looked like a team that wanted to win. So the question is, why couldn’t they get it going earlier? The issue wasn’t scoring for Memphis; the issue was that Rio Grande was scoring too. Despite a high of 11 blocks on the game, the Hustle just couldn’t cool off the Vipers as they went on to shoot 45% from the field on 95 field goal attempts, including the human blowtorch Cam Whitmore once again carving out a game high of 28 points. Lack of defensive control, especially in the first half, is what set the Hustle up for trouble early, and if they could’ve adjusted better in the first half, I believe this would’ve been one for their win column.

G.G. Jackson bounced back in true G.G. form, pouring in a smooth double-double of 25 points with 11 rebounds and 3 assists, while Jake Laravia contributed 22 points and 6 rebounds, with the pair pouring in the two most impressive performances of the evening. The bench also didn’t offer much production tonight as the Hustle were doubled by the Vipers in bench points, 46-23, which is somewhat unusual for this squad as there is typically consistency with bench scoring, especially between David Johnson and Adonis Arms.

The Hustle will resume action on Friday morning versus the Raptors 905, the former team of David Johnson, at 9:30 a.m. in Orlando, FL to cap off the G League Winter Showcase.