Memphis is going through a youth movement. It is the youngest team in the league with an average age of just over 25. And youth served the Grizzlies well last night, particularly Gay, in a 102-97 win over the Sixers.

Gay, in his fourth season out of Connecticut, continually made long jumpers over a plethora of defenders, and glided to the basket when needed, en route to 33 points to lead the Grizzlies to their third straight win and first on the road. The loss dropped the Sixers to 5-7.

Sixers coach Eddie Jordan didn't try to hide his disappointment after his team's performance.

"There were two different teams out there tonight," Jordan said. "One team sort of rallied around each other and the other team fragmented. And that's just laying it on the line and being honest.

"I'm not going to sugarcoat it. We went separate ways with five individuals on the floor who didn't know how to rally around each other. It's a game that we could have won. It was about team versus non-team. We could have won if we had some sort of camaraderie and positive energy. I don't know if it was selfishness or if it was just not coming together as a team. There was no sort of leadership."

In addition to Gay, the Sixers had trouble containing the Grizzlies' inside tandem of Marc Gasol and Zach Randolph, with Jordan continually looking to find matchups to either stop them or be able to exploit them on the offensive end with a smaller lineup. Nothing much worked as Randolph (21 points, 11 rebounds) and Gasol (19 and eight) owned the paint much of the contest. Gasol made six of eight shots and now has hit 21 of his last 24 over three games. Gay also added 10 rebounds as Memphis crushed the Sixers on the boards, 48-28.

Jordan tried to match the Grizzlies' size advantage in the second quarter, giving center Primoz Brezec his first run of the season, teaming with center Jason Smith to try to clog the middle against the 7-1 Gasol and rookie sub Hasheem Thabeet, who goes 7-3.

But that didn't work out too well. Memphis went on a 12-2 run, with 10 points coming in the paint and the other two from the foul line for a 43-37 lead midway through the second quarter.

Jordan countered by going with a small lineup, and that did work as the Sixers scored 11 of the final 15 points before halftime to take a 50-49 lead.

Gay scored the Grizzlies' first 10 points of the second half, the last three on a trey from the left wing that tied the game, 59-59. They never trailed after that.

"He [Gay] made a lot of tough shots with guys with hands in his face or his fadeaway jumper with guys jumping out at him," said Sixers forward Thad Young. "When a guy's making tough shots like that, sometimes you can't do anything but just keep trying to play defense."

Iguodala shared his coach's thought of Memphis playing a good "team" game.

"They did a good job of having a solid performance as a team and they outrebounded us," he said. "They got good looks and went to their go-to guy and got it going. Then their second guy got it going and from there they went right on down the line."

Lou Williams had a career-high 31 points for the Sixers on 12-for-16 shooting and set a career mark with six steals. Elton Brand put in his second straight strong performance with a season-high 22 points while Iguodala added 15.

The Grizzlies grew the lead to 10 at 96-86 on a fastbreak layup by Gay with 4 minutes, 7 seconds left in regulation, but the Sixers then used a 9-2 spurt to pull within 98-95 with 43 seconds left.

Gay hit an open 18-foot jumper with 19 seconds left, and just 1 second on the shot clock to up the lead to five and help Memphis seal the win.

"That's our strength, our inside play," said Grizzlies coach Lionel Hollins. "I just wanted to come in and play how we play, and that's to attack the basket. We did that. We had 25 free throws, we shot 52 percent, we had 48 rebounds and 17 offensive rebounds."

It was that performance that not only left Jordan questioning his team's unity, but also its toughness, a topic that has become a common theme lately.

"Their will and determination was much higher than ours," Jordan said. "If you're not a physical team . . . It's an old saying that if you don't bite as puppies, you're not going to bite as dogs. If you didn't rebound as a young man or a teenager, then you aren't going to rebound when it's time to be a man."

Rudy Gay was the man last night. Not the one most in the crowd probably were hoping to see, but the man nonetheless.

Six shots

 

Jason Kapono, who played under 9 minutes last night, was limping badly in the locker room after the game, his left ankle wrapped in ice. He has a sprained ankle and is questionable for tonight's game in Cleveland, which will be playing its fourth game in 5 days. The game will be on Comcast Network and WIP (610-AM) . . . Swingman Rodney Carney, who was limited in Thursday's practice due to a sprained wrist after playing 30-plus minutes on Wednesday, played just 10 minutes last night. He did hit a three-pointer in the second quarter just 20 seconds after entering the game . . . For the second straight game, Elton Brand played the entire first quarter. *