betprepare.com

Both teams lost the season openers

The Grizzlies suffered the worst defeat since 2008 at home yesterday, but there's still enough reason for optimisms, since they won the last 11 head-to-head matches against the Pacers

After not making it into playoffs last season, the Pacers made a complete change in philosophy, which didn't help them much in Toronto last night. The Raptors beat them 106-99 after Vogel's team opened the match brilliantly to hit 30 points in the first quarter. But they went on to struggle on the offensive end, especially in the second half in which they allowed the opponents to hit 69 points, which is definitely too much.

- I think we lost focus in the third quarter, which cost us - coach Vogel said. His team lost the rebounding battle 50-40.

The Pacers conceded 46 points from the paint, which would not have been so bad if they didn't have field goal efficiency of only 37,2 percent. Monta Ellis, the Pacers' greatest acquisition, had horrible shooting to get limited to only 9 points (3/11).

- This definitely hurts. I wish we had done better - Paul George said. He managed to finish with 17 points even though he went 4-for-17 from the floor. He added 12 rebounds and 8 assist as well. 

- He was always able to assist. Sometimes when shooting isn't working, you have to find other ways to affect the game. I think that's what he did - coach Vogel said about his top player.

George Hill hit team-high 19 points (6-for-10), while Miles and Stucky added 18 and 16 points, respectfully. The team from Indianapolish has not opened the season with 2 defeats since 2009. But, they will have to do much better today in order to prevent that from happening. 

Memphis cannot be happy with their start either. They lost to the Cavaliers 106-76 last night. David Joerger's team opened the game on a 4/25 shooting from the floor, which is why it's no surprise they were in a 21-point deficit by half time. They managed to become the first team that finished with ten or less points in the first 12 minutes of the game after the 24-second attack limitation was introduced. 

- This is very tough to get over. We had no timing. We made a lot of uncharacteristic mistakes - the Grizzlies coach said following their worst home defeat since 2008.

The Grizzlies finished with a field-goal efficiency of only 35,4 percent. Courtney Lee and Mike Conely fell short of expectations to hit only 4 points in 17 shots. Marc Gasol and Randolph weren't much better either. Thy had only 12 points and combined only 13 rebounds. To make matters even worse, the team from Memphis got overpowered in the paint, which is normally their strength. They allowed the Cavs to finish with 48 points from the paint, while they hit only 36. They also lost the rebound battle 54-40. On top of everything, the Grizzlies went 2-for-16 in three pointers, so the bad defeat isn't a surprise at all.

The Grizzlies lost the opening two games only once in the last 7 seasons. They can be happy with the face they won 8 out of the last 11 games against the Pacers, including three in a row. Randolph is averaging 19,9 points against the Pacers, which is his third best percentage against any opponent in the league. On the other hand, George is averaging only 11,4 points and has field-goal efficiency of only 34,6 percent against the Grizzlies. 

There are only two other teams in the league against which Randolph does better than against the Pacers. His average against Indiana is 19,9 points. last year, he hit 22 (7/14) and 18 points (7/12) last season and I think he will be around those numbers again tonight. The Grizzlies did horribly yesterday against the Cavs to suffer the worst home loss since 2008. That is why I expect the Big Three (Conley, Gasol, Randolph) to be very motivated. I decided to go with Z-Bo because of the stats and the matchup. George is a great defender but I don+t think he stands any chance of stopping Randolph, who is some 20 pounds heavier and has no problems handling even centers. I don't expect George to be successful in guarding Randolph, who should be dominant against the typical tall players like Hill and Allen. Neither of them is a typical defender. Also, the Grizzlies's power forward went over this margin in 49 out of 71 games last season.