There are four teams involved in a race to the bottom in the Western Conference, and one that would be if it hadn’t given up unprotected first-round pick to the Atlanta Hawks. Of those four, the Utah Jazz and the Sacramento Kings have received more attention for their blatant tactics.
Two other long-shots are also seeking luck in the lottery. The Dallas Mavericks are looking for a long-term running mate for 2025 first overall pick Cooper Flagg, while the Memphis Grizzlies are looking for a new franchise player after dealing Jaren Jackson Jr. and trying (unsuccessfully) to trade Ja Morant. The two teams will face off tonight with an 8:40 p.m. ET matchup in Dallas.
Both teams have fairly substantial injury lists, with Santi Aldama (knee), Kyle Anderson (personal), Kentavious Caldwell-Pope (finger), Brandon Clarke (calf), Cedric Coward (knee), Zach Edey (ankle), and Morant (elbow) remaining out for the Grizzlies and Ty Jerome (thigh) doubtful. The Mavericks will be without Flagg (foot) and Marvin Bagley III (neck), with Daniel Gafford (ankle), P.J. Washington (ankle), and Klay Thompson (rest) all doubtful. Caleb Martin (back) is questionable.
Dallas is a 3.5-point favorite at DraftKings Sportsbook (-170 on the Moneyline), with the point total set to 238.5. Memphis is +142 on the Moneyline. Below, I’ll break down this contest and offer a prediction.
Memphis Grizzlies at Dallas Mavericks preview, prediction
The Grizzlies have been one of the worst teams in basketball for the last two months, going just 6-20 since December 27, and their only wins this month have come against the Jazz and the Kings. Injuries have played a major role in that, but Memphis’ roster construction also isn’t great: after dealing away both Jackson and Jock Landale to Utah, the Grizzlies don’t currently have a healthy center. Beyond getting healthy, they’ll need Jaylen Wells to build on some of the promise he showed last season as a rookie and hope that 2023 Jazz lottery pick Taylor Hendricks still has some untapped potential.
The Mavericks haven’t been much better, going a full month between wins on January 22 and February 22, and they’re coming off of a loss against Sacramento, which shut three of its best players down for the season. Not all is negative for Dallas, though: Flagg averaged 32.0 points and 7.7 rebounds per game on 53-45-84 shooting splits in his final six games before going down, and Naji Marshall and Max Christie have both established themselves as long-term starting options, with Marshall dropping at least 30 points thrice this month and Christie ranking 15th league-wide in three-point percentage.
Grizzlies at Mavericks pick, best bet
Despite his gaudy counting stats, Flagg’s absence isn’t a massively impactful one. This season, in the 1,139 minutes that he’s been off the court, the Mavericks have actually had a net rating 3.1 points per 100 possessions higher. They’ve also been significantly better without Washington (negative-5.2 on-off impact), Thompson (negative-3.1), Bagley (negative-8.6), and Gafford (negative-2.7). Meanwhile, Memphis’ most impactful absence is actually its rookie Coward, as it has been 6.8 points per 100 possessions better with him than without him. The Grizzlies have also had the equivalent of the best offense in NBA history — and the worst defense in NBA history — in the 168 minutes that Jerome has taken the court.
Memphis might find it easier to get to the rim than normal, given that Dallas has allowed restricted-area tries at the league’s fourth-highest rate, though it has gotten slightly better since Flagg’s injury. The issue is that the Grizzlies are poorly-equipped to take advantage of those opportunities; since the trade deadline, they’ve converted layups at the league’s 10th-lowest rate, and they’ll miss Aldama’s and Coward’s finishing. Memphis has also struggled to protect the rim since the trade deadline, allowing the league’s fourth-highest percentage across that span, but the Mavericks have been great at neither getting downhill nor finishing.
Dallas should have a slight edge on the boards, as since the trade deadline, the Grizzlies have had a putrid 44.9% total rebounding percentage, a mark that would be the worst in NBA history across a full season. The Mavericks haven’t been great across that span, either, but each of Flagg, Washington, and Gafford has had a slightly negative on-off impact on the boards, so they might be okay tonight. Memphis should be able to make up for some of its disadvantages with superior transition play, but Dallas has one of the league’s best free-throw differentials and should be able to take easy points at the charity stripe.
The Grizzlies could make up for some of their disadvantages through their shooting. For the season, they have allowed among the most wide-open threes per game and the Mavericks a roughly league-average amount, but in recent games, that’s flipped; since the trade deadline, Dallas has conceded the fourth-most uncontested triples and Memphis the fourth-fewest. The Grizzlies have also been somewhat better at generating uncontested looks, an advantage that has only grown since the trade deadline. Christie ranks as the league’s ninth-most talented qualified shooters by three-point percentage over expectation, but he’ll need to be clinical, especially with Thompson (the Mavericks’ other primary sharpshooter) unlikely to suit up. So, too, will Cam Spencer, who’s hit 44.0% of his threes this season but doesn’t have the volume to qualify.
Given how small the sample size is for each roster in its current iteration, this game is a hard one to predict, and it could go either way, but I really like this post-deadline Memphis team’s transition play and hustle on closeouts. The Grizzlies are too weak on the glass and Jerome matters too much offensively for me to feel comfortable taking them on the Moneyline. I’ll go with one of my favorite bets — for the game to enter crunch time.
