March 30th, 2008 
Stephen Rhodes 
Posted in 
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The NBA, night-in and night-out, proves that on any given day, any opponent is capable of beating the other.? That folks, is another way of saying that parity reigns supreme.? A good example is the game played Saturday night between the Memphis Grizzlies and Los Angeles Clippers; last night, the Grizzlies beat the Los Angeles Lakers.? But somehow they found a way to lose to the Clippers as Al Thornton’s 20 second-half points helped Los Angeles soundly beat Memphis 110-97 at Staples Center.
Memphis would take their first lead, 26-24, on Rudy Gay’s dunk with 9:51 left in the first half, but Los Angeles would go into halftime leading 47-43.? Los Angeles’ Thornton would make consecutive 3-pointers to pad their lead to 81-71 with 11 minutes left to go; the Grizzlies’ Kyle Lowry got Memphis as close as 7 with a layup? with 6:17 remaining.? But Los Angeles would respond with a 10-2 run, capped by a trey by Thornton, giving the Clippers a 99-84 advantage with 3:47 left.? Memphis would not even get close from that juncture.
Los Angeles was led by the aforementioned Thornton with a career-high 39 points, including 3 treys, 3 rebounds, 2 assists and 4 steals while Corey Maggette scored 26 with 7 rebounds, 4 assists and 3 steals; Brevin Knight recorded a double-double as he poured in 14 with 2 rebounds, 11 assists, a steal and a block.? Memphis was led by Gay with 23 points, 6 rebounds, an?assist and a steal while Lowry, from off the bench, scored 20 with 2 rebounds and 3 assists; Mike Conley added 17 with a rebound and 5 assists.? Los Angeles (22-51)?remains at home?to host the Dallas Mavericks on Monday while Memphis (19-54) returns home to host the Atlanta Hawks – also on Monday.??
