Insider Insights: Rough Shooting Buries the Grizzlies in the Season-Opener

As expected, the Grizzlies started Marcus Smart, Desmond Bane, Ziaire Williams, Jaren Jackson Jr., and Xavier Tillman to begin their 2023-2024 season against the New Orleans Pelicans. The Grizzlies Core Four legends, Tony Allen and Zach Randolph, announced the starting lineups with an orchestra playing Three 6 Mafia’s “Poppin’ My Collar.”

Z-Bo & TA announcing player intros 🔥🔥🔥 #BackToTheGrind pic.twitter.com/UEbUebPsDX

— Parish Sharkey (@DaOne_PShark) October 26, 2023

Xavier Tillman kicked off the scoring for the season with an easy dunk to begin the game for the Grizzlies. From there, the teams traded baskets throughout the rest of the first quarter as Desmond Bane led the way on offense with ten early points, and Jaren Jackson Jr. paced the defense with three blocks as the Grizzlies led 28-25 at the end of the first quarter. Also, with 4:04 remaining in the first, University of Memphis legend Derrick Rose entered the game to an expected standing ovation.

Derrick Rose entered for his first regular season game to a standing ovation as expected #BackToTheGrind pic.twitter.com/BnKUGBgocS

— Parish Sharkey (@DaOne_PShark) October 26, 2023

The Grizzlies’ offense began to stall as the second quarter opened; the Pelicans began playing zone defense to force the struggling Grizzlies to continue shooting. As the Grizzlies continued to falter from deep, the Pelicans heated up, turning a three-point deficit into a 15-point lead.

Desmond Bane led the charge to inject life into the offense with back-to-back threes to spearhead a 10-0 run to cut the Pelicans’ lead down to five, but Zion Williamson responded with back-to-back dunks that led to the Pelicans ending the half on a 5-0 run. The Pels led 57-47 at the break.

The second half began similarly to how the first half ended, with the Grizzlies settling for threes on the offensive end while getting punched in the mouth on the defensive end. The Pelicans extended their lead to as many as 17 points in this stretch.

The Grizzlies’ bench unit, along with Desmond Bane and Jaren Jackson Jr., made a mini spurt to cut the deficit down to single digits, but the Pelicans ended the third quarter with back-to-back baskets from “Grizzlies-killer” CJ McCollum and Brandon Ingram to lead 82-70 heading into the fourth.

Sorry Grizz fans. 😂 pic.twitter.com/xA9jvBgSog

— 3 the Hardaway (@3theHardawayPod) October 26, 2023

The Grizzlies finally started attacking the rim more in the fourth quarter, but it proved too little too late as the Pelicans’ interior offense was too much for the Grizzlies, and they lost the season opener 111-104.

Now for the main takeaway:

The Frontcourt Usage

With the season-ending surgery of Steven Adams and the loss of Santi Aldama to start the season, the Grizzlies started Tillman and Jackson Jr. in the frontcourt. With limited bigs on the bench, David Roddy was the first sub as the Grizzlies decided to go small in the early going. Jake LaRavia came in shortly afterward to first pair with Tillman, then Jaren in the frontcourt.

The spacing was very apparent with this lineup as the Grizzlies garnered plenty of open looks from deep in the first quarter. The open looks were not falling, but the opportunity was there as Taylor Jenkins continued to play these lineups throughout the remainder of the game. The result ended up with the Pelicans outrebounding the Grizzlies 52-37 and the Grizzlies shooting 12-43 from three.

As Taylor Jenkins continued with the same rotation of Jaren and Tillman splitting with Roddy/LaRavia, the results varied. LaRavia and Roddy helped the bench unit make a run in the third quarter just as hope seemed to be lost with the game, but the rebounding disadvantage proved to be too much as the Pelicans’ big men continued to create opportunities against the Grizzlies’ depleted frontcourt.

The solution seems simple for now, which is to play the only true big on the bench in Kennth Lofton Jr. Coach Jenkins mentioned that he envisions him being in the lineup at some point, but more frontcourt depth is needed, and this game made it obvious. The need to add another big to this roster is very glaring regardless of Santi Aldama’s status going forward with his ankle injury, as he is more of a finesse big than a bruiser. Tillman played really well, but bringing in someone to play behind him is badly needed for this team.

Start, Stop, and Continue

Start: Actively finding ways to get Jaren Jackson Jr. easier shots early in the game. Big men naturally need the ball earlier in the ball game to get into their groove for the rest of the night, but Jaren’s game was relegated to the perimeter to start, and he struggled as he shot 0-4 with zero points at the half. It is a two-way street as Jaren has to be more assertive himself with getting into position and demanding the ball either in face-up or post situations, but the strategy could be better with getting him in the flow early on. You can’t have your (current) best or second-best player (not counting Ja in this scenario) scoring eight points and expect to win.

Jaren has to be more aggressive on offense if the Grizzlies are going to win this game, no reason he should have 4 shots and 3 of them from three at halftime

— Bryson (@BrysonWright3) October 26, 2023

Stop: Letting it fly from three to the point that it becomes your whole offense. Out of the Grizzlies’ 47 shot attempts in the first half, 28 were three-point attempts. That is fine when the team is connecting at a good percentage, but the team shot 25% from three in the first half, and the second half did not yield much better results. The team finished the game shooting 12-43 from three, with Luke Kennard and Jaren Jackson Jr. combining to shoot 0-10. For comparison, the Pelicans made 14 threes on 11 fewer attempts. If the shots are not falling, which was apparent early outside of Desmond Bane, then an adjustment should be made. The team shot 54% on two-point attempts and 80% from the free-throw line while outscoring the Pelicans 50-46 in paint points. Play to your strengths!

Continue: Letting Desmond Bane cook! Despite the overall poor performance from the team tonight, Desmond Bane was a huge positive (Also, shoutout to Xavier Tillman and Marcus Smart for solid outings). The chatter of Desmond Bane becoming an NBA All-Star was on full display tonight as he scored 31 points on an efficient 50% shooting from both the field and three while chipping in five rebounds, five assists, and two steals. The Grizzlies will need those types of performances from Bane consistently until Ja returns, and he is more than capable of keeping up this level of play. Bane mentioned that he is willing to do whatever the team needs and that he is trying to win and wants to be known as a winning player more than a scorer or facilitator.

31-5-5. If you think Austin Reaves is better than Desmond Bane, just block me. 😂

— Savage (@MSavage901) October 26, 2023

Coming Up

The Grizzlies will look to recover from this loss as they remain home to welcome the defending NBA champions in the Denver Nuggets at the FedExForum Friday night at 6:00 PM.

Final Quote

“Definitely wasn’t the result we wanted, but I’ve never seen a championship won or come close to winning in the first game. We got 81 games left.” – Marcus Smart.

Seeing A LOT of overreactions 48 minutes into the season.

We don’t have Ja, we don’t have BC, we don’t have Steven, we didn’t have Santi.

We had a crew of young players, new players, and guys playing out of their traditional role.

We lost by 7.

Relax. There’s 81 more… pic.twitter.com/6UOBrW2nUK

— myke (@hakymaqua) October 26, 2023