Red-hot Spurs knock off slumping Grizzlies in potential 1st-round preview

The Memphis Grizzlies will likely want to do whatever they can to avoid the San Antonio Spurs in the first round of the playoffs.

The two teams are trending in opposite directions, and their current respective levels were on display in the Spurs' routine, wire-to-wire 103-89 win on Sunday. 

The Spurs, peaking (to the surprise of no one) at just the right time, had the ball zipping around on a string, and seemed to have an answer any time the Grizzlies threatened. 

The Grizzlies did manage to keep things relatively tight for a while, and their scuffling offense - which has now failed to crack 90 points in three straight games - got a shot in the arm from an energized Jeff Green off the bench. 

But the Spurs never relinquished the lead, and broke down the Grizzlies' vaunted defense in the fourth quarter, pouring in 33 points to pull away. It certainly didn't help that Memphis was playing without its best perimeter defender, as Tony Allen was ruled out with a hamstring injury shortly before tipoff. 

Without another defender capable of matching Spurs swingman Kawhi Leonard for size, strength and quickness, Leonard had a field day. He scored the Spurs' first 15 points of the final frame, as his team stretched a four-point lead to 16 in six minutes. He finished with 25 points (on 11-of-17 shooting), 10 rebounds and a game-high plus-17 rating. 

The loss was the third straight for the Grizzlies, who are now just 8-8 in March. It also knocked them out of second place in the Western Conference, a spot they've occupied for more than two months. Usurping them is the Houston Rockets, the first non-Memphis team to hold the No. 2 seed since the Portland Trail Blazers sat there back on Jan. 21.

That means that if the season ended today, the Grizzlies would play the Spurs, who just won for the 13th time in their last 16 games. 

They also swept the Grizzlies out of the Western Conference Finals two years ago.