Not long ago this season, this matchup was widely considered a potential preview of a new-look Western Conference finals.
It was a case of the NBA’s two most electrifying point guards guiding their respective promising young cores onto the league’s biggest stage. All things considered; these two teams were relatively ahead of schedule.
Their respective championship widows were just beginning to open.
The Oklahoma City Thunder and the Memphis Grizzlies were first and second in the Western Conference standings entering the first two of their four regular season meetings this season.
Now, as they get set for their final showdown Thursday in Oklahoma City, these squads are motivated by far different priorities as they push toward the end of the NBA’s 82-game grind.
The Thunder are 3-0 against the Grizzlies and has essentially lapped the field in the West to become the NBA’s first team this season to reach 60 wins. OKC has already clinched the No. 1 seed in the conference playoff race with three weeks remaining. The Thunder earned the right to basically coast the rest of the way and focus on entering the playoffs as healthy as possible.
The only sliver of doubt remaining for OKC (60-12) is whether superstar Shai Gilgeous-Alexander will secure his first league MVP trophy by a close margin or in a landslide over fellow top contenders in Denver’s Nikola Jokic and Milwaukee’s Giannis Antetokounmpo.
Meanwhile, the Grizzlies (44-28) simply have plenty of work to do just to enter the playoffs in ideal position. After three straight losses to the Kings, Blazers and Clippers to open the trip, Memphis got a much-needed breakthrough in Tuesday’s 140-103 blowout at Utah.
With 10 games remaining as they wrap up this grueling 12-day trek with Thursday’s stop in OKC, the Grizzlies are in contention to finish in either of drastically different circumstances.
They are still capable of stringing enough wins together to finish as high as second in the West to reclaim the No. 2 spot they’ve held for stretches this season. Or, if they’re unable to get or stay healthy and overcome recent slippage, the Grizzlies could stumble into Play-In territory.
At this point, the Thunder have the luxury of guarantees.
The Grizzlies have the burden of a real battle on their hands.
As they await the return of star point guard Ja Morant, who has missed the past five games nursing a strained hamstring, the Grizzlies face the third-toughest closing schedule among all West teams in postseason contention.
In fact, eight of these final 10 games are against teams desperately jockeying to improve their playoff positioning. The lone two opponents that aren’t are the safe-and-secure Thunder on Thursday and a road game in April against the lottery-bound Hornets.
So as the Grizzlies try to rediscover who they are at this stage of the season, they still have a chance to control where they land amid this quest to regain their footing for the postseason.
“Obviously, we’re in a slide right now and we’ve got to dig our way out of it,” Grizzlies coach Taylor Jenkins insisted during the trip. “We know what the standings are, the seedings are – homecourt advantage. But we can’t be thinking about that. We’ve got to recapture our best version that we’ve displayed throughout the season. Hopefully, we can get healthy here. We know what our standard is. That’s going to be our recipe for success.”
That quest for health took a significant blow last week when the Grizzlies lost veteran power forward and versatile defender Brandon Clarke for the rest of the season with a knee injury. That rotation absence places even more of a premium on getting Morant back in the mix soon.
After Thursday’s game at OKC, the Grizzlies return home to face the Lakers, Celtics and Warriors in arguably the most daunting homestand of the season.
The Lakers just got LeBron James back and are hunting for a homecourt advantage seed alongside the Rockets, Nuggets and Grizzlies. Those four teams are separated by just three games in the standings, from second to fifth place. So, someone among that group will have to open the first round of the playoffs on the road.
The Celtics, meanwhile, are rounding into form for a repeat run as NBA champions. Although they’re essentially a lock as the East’s No. 2 seed, the Celtics will look to avenge a Dec. 7 home loss to Memphis when they arrive for Monday’s TNT nationally-televised game. The Grizzlies notched their most impressive road win of the season in that 127-121 victory earlier this season after 10 consecutive losses at Boston.
And the Warriors have been one of the NBA’s hottest teams since acquiring Jimmy Butler at the trade deadline, even as they await Steph Curry’s likely return this weekend from a pelvic injury.
Right now, there is very little margin for error remaining for Memphis.
That’s why, right now, this final Grizzlies-Thunder matchup isn’t really a measuring stick for Memphis in terms of Western Conference finals potential.
Instead, consider it more of a temperature check of their potential playoff pulse.