Magic at Grizzlies
The Memphis Grizzlies had been playing it tight for the last week and finally got burned at the end of the game on Saturday. The Grizzlies will try to bounce back and earn their fifth win in the last six games when they host the Orlando Magic on Monday.
Memphis put together a four-game winning streak with all four victories coming by singles digits and three coming by two points or fewer. The inability to put opponents away came back to bite the team on Saturday, when the Minnesota Timberwolves ended the game on a 5-0 run to pull out a 106-101 victory. The Magic have not been putting any opponents away lately and enter the three-game road trip losers of five straight and nine of their last 10. “Character is built during adversity and it shows,” Orlando guard Victor Oladipo told reporters. “What kind of real character do we all have is the real question right now. This is a little adversity and it’s tough, but we’re better than this and we know it.”
TV: 8 p.m. ET, FSN Florida (Orlando), FSN Southeast (Memphis)
ABOUT THE MAGIC (20-22): Orlando blew a golden opportunity to snap out of its slide when it squandered a 15-point, fourth-quarter lead on Friday and lost in overtime at home to the Charlotte Hornets. “We’ll start rolling and things will start working and anybody can see that we’re clicking offensively with a double-digit lead and then all of a sudden it’s, ‘I’ve got to do something,’ or maybe, ‘I haven’t scored in a while,’ instead of continuing to trust the ball movement and the execution,” Magic coach Scott Skiles explained to reporters. “We get away from what’s working and the other team turns it up.” Orlando plays five of its next six games on the road, including trips to San Antonio and Oklahoma City.
ABOUT THE GRIZZLIES (25-20): Memphis has been dealing with some nagging injuries to key players and could not coax much out of Marc Gasol (knee contusion) or Mike Conley (Achilles) on Saturday while Tony Allen (knee/hamstring) missed the game completely. Gasol and Conley spent most of the fourth quarter on the bench and combined for two points in the decisive period against the Timberwolves. The Grizzlies signed veteran big man Ryan Hollins to a 10-day contract on Thursday for a third stint with the team and are putting him to work immediately with a total of 33 minutes off the bench in the last two games backing up Gasol and power forward Zach Randolph.
BUZZER BEATERS
1. Grizzlies SG Courtney Lee is 15-of-25 from the field in the last four games.
2. Magic SG Evan Fournier is 11-of-39 from the field in the last three contests.
3. Memphis has taken eight straight in the series.