A look at three key numbers related to Monday’s game at the Smoothie King Center between Memphis and New Orleans (7 p.m., Fox Sports New Orleans, WRNO 99.5 FM:
15: Combined games won by New Orleans and Memphis over the two teams’ last 20 games. The Grizzlies are on a three-game winning streak and have gone 8-2 over their last 10 games. Only Oklahoma City (9-1) has been better over a current 10-game span in the Western Conference. Meanwhile, the Pelicans have won two in a row and are 7-3 over the same stretch of schedule. New Orleans has capitalized on its recent home cooking by going 5-1 during a seven-game homestand that concludes with Monday’s game. Nine of Memphis’ last 11 games have been at FedEx Forum, but the Grizzlies are just 3-8 on the road since mid-December.
27: Memphis’ rank in the NBA in pace (possessions per 48 minutes), at 95.57, via NBA.com. On the other hand, New Orleans is 13th in the league in pace (98.39). The Pelicans don’t want to play a slowdown type style against the Grizzlies, who love to force a methodical game that often includes pounding the ball inside to excellent bigs Marc Gasol and Zach Randolph. Memphis has been very effective offensively against New Orleans while going 2-0 in head-to-head matchups, including a 113-104 win Dec. 1 at the Smoothie King Center. The 113-point output is the Grizzlies’ fourth-highest total of 2015-16. Gasol poured in 38 points.
27: Memphis’ rank in three-point attempts per game, at just 17.5. The Grizzlies have been resistant to adopt the league’s trend in recent years of relying much more heavily on shots beyond the arc, instead preferring to score in the paint. New Orleans has gone in the opposite direction, taking many more treys under first-year head coach Alvin Gentry. The Pelicans take the 13th-most trifectas in the NBA (24.8). Behind a recent barrage of accurate three-point shooting, forward Ryan Anderson has moved up to No. 20 in the league in percentage (40.2). He has 19 threes in the past four games.
