Last night’s Lakers-Grizzlies game was awesome.  You had Kobe’s quick three, two missed foul shots from Mike Conley, then a missed game winning three from Ron Artest.  With all of that action going on, it is easy to forget that the most important play was the one that happened right before the others I have mentioned.  That play is the Rudy Gay 3 that took the Grizzlies lead from 2 to 5:

Up by two, the Grizzlies are in no rush here.  They walk the ball up and kill 10 seconds before they even start their offense.  Mark Gasol cuts through, and right after the cut, Zach Randolph comes sets a screen for Conley.

This isn’t a pick and roll to free up Conley or anything like that.  It is so they can hopefully get a switch and a mismatch for Zach Randolph.  Randolph scored the last 3 buckets for the Grizzlies, and he is the guy they like to go through late.  Randolph doesn’t look for the roll, instead he goes right to the block and tries to get a post-up.  As this happens, Marc Gasol pops to the high post to be a safety valve for Conley.

The Lakers do a very good job of denying Randolph (Odom is so big and mobile, he is able to get around and front him).  Conley can’t get it to Randolph, so he hits the flashing Marc Gasol.  As the pass to the high post gets made, Randolph cuts into the middle, looking for a high-low pass.  This little cut to the middle causes Ron Artest to sink to deny it.

Gasol looks, doesn’t see and opening, and quickly reverses the ball to the corner where Rudy Gay is wide open.  As the pass is half-way there to him, Ron Artest is still a good 20 feet away from him.  That is too far.

Gay makes the catch and fires.  Artest is too far away to get a good close-out, and Gay knocks it down.  This shot was so pretty, that the net didn’t move, it took me a second or two to realize that it went in.