NBA Play-in: What you need to know about the Trail Blazers and Grizzlies
The NBA’s dream of a play-in is upon us as Damian Lillard’s Portland Trail Blazers will face Ja Morant’s Memphis Grizzlies. Here’s what you need to know.
The season has continued successfully and now approaching the playoffs, the NBA has one last trick up their sleeves — the newest experiment in the NBA bubble is the play-in tournament. In this play-in, Damian Lillard and the Portland Trail Blazers will face Ja Morant‘s Memphis Grizzlies.
This play-in tournament allows the teams prior to the bubble on the brink of the playoffs to have a chance to make it, and after the eight bubble games, the Portland Trail Blazers have earned the right to fight for the eighth seed to face the Los Angeles Lakers.
The play-in is a one-to-three game series where the eighth-seeded Trailblazers only need to win one game, but the ninth-seeded Grizzlies need to win two games to earn the playoff spot.
The Trail Blazers – more so Damian Lillard, have been on a tear. They went 6-2 within the bubble and Lillard is currently on a ridiculous average of 37.6 points and 9.3 assists per game and close to a 50/40/90 split within these games (48 percent from the field, 41 percent from three and 88 percent from the free throw line.)
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These teams have faced off before, in the first for both teams with it ending in an overtime duel with the Grizzlies losing by five. Unfortunately for the Grizzlies, two key players during the bubble in Jaren Jackson Jr. and Tyus Jones (Justice Winslow never played but was still missed) are out for the playoffs. The do-or-die situation falls solely on should be Rookie of the Year Ja Morant.
With Jackson Jr. out the Grizzlies have seen Dillon Brooks make up for the 25.3 points Jackson Jr. averaged in his three games in Orlando, Brooks since Jackson Jr.’s injury has scored 23 points per game on 36 percent from three.
So can Ja Morant’s depleted Grizzlies win one game against the Trail Blazers? Or will Lillard carry his team into the playoffs for the seventh straight season?