MEMPHIS, Tenn. -- The Grizzlies refused to be pushed around, especially on their home court, and now theyre headed back to the Western Conference semifinals for the second time in three seasons. Mike Conley and Zach Randolph scored 23 points each, and the Grizzlies beat the Los Angeles Clippers 118-105 on Friday night to take the first-round series 4-2. The Grizzlies had never won four straight post-season games before this series. They became only the 10th team in NBA history to win four straight after trailing 0-2 -- the first to win the next four all by double digits. They will open the second round at Oklahoma City on Sunday in a rematch of the franchises only other Western semifinal that the Thunder won in seven games in 2011. "Now this series is over," Grizzlies centre Marc Gasol said. "Its time to enjoy tonight and be ready tomorrow. Its a quick turnaround, so we can enjoy tonight." Memphis finished with seven players in double figures. Tony Allen had a post-season-best 19 points, and Jerryd Bayless had 16. Reserve Matt Barnes scored a career playoff-best 30 points for Los Angeles. Chris Paul had 28 points before being ejected with 2:29 left for crashing into Gasol off a missed free throw, though he shook hands with several Grizzlies before going to the locker room. Clippers coach Vinny Del Negro, whose contract is up after this season, said he didnt understand how Paul could be thrown out of the game. Paul had never been ejected from the playoffs before, and he thanked an unnamed friend for reminding him to watch what he said to reporters. "I got kids to feed," Paul said. Blake Griffin didnt start because of his sprained right ankle, and he scored nine points in 13:56. Del Negro said Griffins ankle was as big as a grapefruit limiting him to a few minutes at a stretch. Paul also is a free agent July 1, leaving plenty of decisions to be made about where the Clippers go from here. "This is not how we wanted it to end," Griffin said. NBA Commissioner David Stern was on hand along with Atlanta Falcons receiver Julio Jones. Conley had old Ohio State teammate Greg Oden in the arena as well. Having the commissioner on hand didnt slow anyone down in a game featuring lots of headlocks and knockdowns with the only thing missing a steel cage as they combined for seven technicals. Even Grant Hill had three fouls in 3 minutes in the first half, and Chauncey Billups got a flagrant-1. "They came out threw and everything at us," Memphis coach Lionel Hollins said of the Clippers. "They played small. They played smaller. They pressed. They zoned. They gave hard fouls. They really competed. We held our poise. Held up mentally tough-wise and were able to get the win." Randolph was ejected, too, with 1:57 remaining. He tossed his headband toward the stands and celebrated as he walked to the locker room. "I was just talking to the bench and exchanging words and (official) Joey (Crawford) he dont play so he tossed me," Randolph said with a slight smile. The Clippers set a franchise record going 56-32 in the regular season, earning the No. 4 seed. They won the first two in Los Angeles but came into Game 6 trying to avoid being eliminated by the team they beat in seven in the first round a year ago. They had hoped to force Game 7 back in Los Angeles on Sunday only to lose four consecutive games for only the third time all season. "We took too long to come to the fight," Paul said. "We waited to Gam 6 to start to play aggressively and match their intensity. I dont even know how many free throws they shot tonight. Maybe more than the field goal attempts that we got." It only seemed that way as the Grizzlies went 38 of 47 at the line while the Clippers shot 41 of 78 from the floor. Billups credited the Grizzlies for never letting them get into a rhythm or their Lob City run and gun approach. "Because of that, we lose the series," Billups said. Los Angeles led only once -- at 45-44 on Barnes fourth 3-pointer with 5:08 left in the second quarter. The teams had four more ties before Quincy Pondexter hit a 3 with 2:02 left putting the Grizzlies ahead to stay at 54-51. The Clippers had one last run, a 10-1 spurt capped by Butlers 20-foot jumper with 5:16 left pulling them within 103-97. Conley hit a 3 followed by a 3 from Bayless, and Randolphs scored inside with 3:06 remaining to push the lead back to double digits at 111-99. It was so physical that Hollins sprinted onto the court in the second quarter after Butler went over Gasols back for a rebound, leaving the Grizzlies centre on the court pushing Butlers leg away as he got up. Billups had as many fouls (four) as points (four). He got a flagrant-1 in the third when he put his body into Conley trying to stop a fast-break layup attempt and putting his right arm around Conleys neck as they went to the floor. Conley hit the free throws, then hit a 3-pointer from the left corner giving the Grizzlies a 74-61 lead with 7:11 left. After the bucket, Randolph and Griffin wrestled themselves to the court in a tangle of bodies. That earned the duo their fourth double-foul in this series with Randolph getting a technical. Paul picked up his own technical from Crawford for his disgust when Randolph scored and picked up the foul. Griffin said the tape will speak for what happened on that play but he felt a hand on his neck. Randolph said Griffin was pulling him down so he tried to brace for the fall. And Griffin was called for a technical in the fourth when he knocked down Allen on a drive to the basket after the Grizzlies guard already had been fouled by Barnes. Bayless hit the free throw for the technical, and Allen added his two pushing the lead back to 97-87. Notes: Hollins played for one of the nine teams that rallied from a 0-2 deficit. He was with Portland in 1977 when the Trail Blazers rallied to beat Philadelphia for the NBA championship. ... The Clippers did manage to snap a streak by the Grizzlies. Memphis had held opponents to 25 points or fewer in the third quarter in 52 straight games since Jan. 14, a streak 25 games longer than any other in the shot clock era. But the Clippers scored 26 in the third. ... Memphis went 23-1 in the regular season when scoring at least 100 points and is 3-0 in the post-season. Cheap Football Jerseys .J. -- Marty Brodeur beat the Pittsburgh Penguins yet again. Fake Football Jerseys Free Shipping . Gerald Green and Miles Plumlee? Green had bounced around the NBA when he wasnt playing overseas. The Pacers gave up on Plumlee after just one season. Now Green and Plumlee are key cogs in the Suns surprising breakout season. https://www.fakefootballjerseys.com/ .5 million, one-year contract on Friday. Hawkins, who turns 41 in December, will compete with Rex Brothers for the closers role at spring training. Football Jerseys China . -- For the first time in two months, an opponent was standing up to Alabama. Knockoff Football Jerseys . Didier Drogba gave away the penalty that put Senegal one goal away from a major upset, but the veteran striker will get another chance -- probably his last -- at the World Cup after Salomon Kalous injury-time strike sealed the Ivorians place in Brazil next year. I was the son of a publican and a master builder. He ran the Empire Hotel in North Hobart. His name was Max, too. Big Max.I was good at football and cricket at school. My dad said, son, be an architect, and I came to Melbourne passionate about becoming an architect.Norm Smith personally came and signed me up to the Melbourne Football Club. The fact that I then played cricket for Melbourne Cricket Club - the footy club didnt like it that much.I thought I could bat. My last two knocks for the North Hobart Cricket Club were 117 and 119, batting at three, at about the age of 17. The footy club brought me across and Melbourne Cricket Club had about six Sheffield Shield batsmen, guys like Paul Sheahan and Graeme Watson, so I batted 10 in my first district match. I barely got a hit at the Albert Ground. We were four or five down for about 380 every Saturday afternoon. But they didnt have a bowler. I had this weird action where I was able to winkle a few guys out.I bowled right-arm over left earhole, legs crossed at the point of delivery.My first baggy green came to the MCG in a parcel, prior to the Pakistan match in 72-73. This parcel had a blazer, a tie, two jumpers and a cap in it. When I came back to the dressing room, all my gear had been moved. Dougie Walters was playing cards and smoking a cigarette, and I said, Dougie, wheres my gear? He said, How many Test matches have you played for Australia? I said this one would be my first. He said, Well, Ive been using that locker now for a couple of series, its mine. I said, But still, wheres my gear? He said, Well, you can start by having a look in the dunny.In 1973, I was the only bloke in the team in the West Indies with a camera. That was a legacy from studying architecture. I love photography. When I went to India last time, I took 3900 shots over three cameras in 14 days.It was a privilege to bowl up the hill, into the breeze, with an old ball on a flat wicket, after Lillee and Thommo. The batsmen had a sense of relief that its been 160kph, now its down to 140kph. There were no helmets, and at 160kph Thommo had no idea where they were going, so what chance did a batsman have?It wasnt a conscious decision to give up footy. It evolved that way. My three-prong attack was to study architecture at RMIT, play footy and cricket. My final-year architecture thesis was due when I got back from a tour of the West Indies. I wanted to qualify, so I shelved footy at the ripe old age of 22 and never got back.We used to have to get special leave without pay in order to go away on cricket tours. Everyone got paid for Christmas Day, Boxing Day and New Years Day, but because I was playing two Test matches and I applied for leave, I got docked for all those days. My colleagues were down on the fence, getting paid to sit there and watch me! We were only getting $400 to play in the match. I smile now when I look at those numbers.I practised as an architect for 10 years. I qualified in 1973 with a fellowship diploma of architecture. World Series Cricket gave me the freedom to go out and pursue architecture.It would have been nice to play Sheffield Shield for Tasmania. But Tasmania didnt have a Shield team at the time. Its all very well now. The last few years, I jokingly say my little brother Ricky was captain of Australia. But back then when I did it, there was a psychological brick wall, almost, in the middle of Bass Strait. Almost like, how dare you think you can go to the mainland and do well? Now there are some fabulous success stories out of Tasmania.The big inswinger was my staple. They perhaps dont swing it as much these days because they play so much of the condensed version, and you can go for a wide very easily if the ball swings more than a little bit. They take the risk out, go across the seam and are more likely to change up and down in pace.In England the cat-gut is about half a gauge heavier than it is here in Australia, so in the first two weeks over there youd lose a lot of skin off the fingers. Youd have to dip them in friars balsam to try and heal it. It was not a good look, this tacky brown liquid. I remember shaking hands with the Queen at Lords and she had the white silk gloves on, and I almost dragged the glove off her hand when I let go.Are we just, by sheer emphasis, killing off Test cricket? Maybe Test cricket needs to be shaped from a financial template. Why not bring it in to four days? You could have the same number of overs and then have a daytime session and a night-time session, like the tennis.I didnt learn to bowl an outswinger until I was about 27. There were no coaching manuals around. I only bowled the outswinger for show. It wasnt to take wickets - just to show that I could. It was a bit like the knuckle ball. The first time I bowled the knuckle ball, which I leearnt from a baseball player, I got hit for six.dddddddddddd What I didnt realise was that youve got to be able to bowl a 140kph bouncer with the same grip.Alan Connolly was a great mentor. He introduced me to reverse-swing before the 1973 series. They talk about Imran Khan and others, but Alan Connolly, almost by default, became aware of reverse-swing with Ray Jordon behind the stumps one day in a Shield match. He said to load up one side with perspiration and saliva, and once the ball was porous, like a rag doll, it becomes heavier. I had great success in the West Indies on the back of that information. I took 26 wickets there, which stood for nearly 30 years as a record, until McGrath broke it.Of the best batsmen I bowled to, Viv Richards stood out. He hit the ball so hard, and images of him dancing down the wicket, hitting Jeff Thomson through the covers on a half-volley - youre not allowed to be able to do that stuff! Greg Chappell hit him in the head once and we all knew where the next one was going, it didnt matter where Greg bowled it. And it did, it went about 30 rows back over deep midwicket. He was incredible.I loved the Centenary Test match. It was like a soap opera over five days. We were bowled out for 138, [Rick] McCoskers jaw got broken, and then we bowled them out for 95 the next day. I got four, and I was certain I was going to get five. I got Tony Greigs wicket, middle and leg stump, through the gate.Against a good player, you might only get one or two chances in an innings. Once youve shown him what youre going to do, its all over, you have to come up with something else.All of the talent base was walking out the back door, symbolically speaking, to sign up with Kerry Packer. We were just asking for a rise in pay. The attitude from the incumbent board then was: there are 50 or 60 other guys who would give their right arm to play for Australia. Its just that they werent as good as Lillee and Marsh and Chappell. The amount of emotion that charged that time was quite tumultuous.We were the best team in the world for a period, under Ian Chappell. Thommo and Lillee and Marsh and Walters and the two Chappells, Ian Redpath, Stackpole, Mallett - gee whiz. For a Tasmanian to sit in the dressing room and look around at that - wow.When I played against Lawrence Rowe for the first time, it was Jamaica v Australia, and this bloke had made 200 and 100 in his first Test. He had some trouble with his eyes later on, but at that stage he was the best player Id ever seen. He made a hundred against us in that match. He batted off stump and was just a very elegant player.I think Australias fast-bowling stocks are still pretty low, for what they could be. I dont know what the reason is there, whether there was a sense of vulnerability from the selection table down. Perhaps the bowlers didnt feel secure and they were always going to be playing for their next game instead of trying to do strategically the best thing for the team, and they were trying to bowl wicket balls all the time. There were so many great moments in the Centenary match. [Rod] Marshy scored a hundred and I was in the middle when he scored it. Kerry OKeeffe opened in the second innings, Hookesys five fours, we met the Queen, and then to match the history of Charlie Bannermans team a century earlier, winning by 45 runs. And then there was Walters trying to make McCosker laugh with a mouthful of piano wire while he was drinking champagne through a straw out of a beer glass. That was a great match.Theres a lot of insight being tabled at the moment about the game in this country, because of performances, and rightly so. But if it is all revealed by players and ex-players and administrators then I think we miss an opportunity. I would like to see more minds that arent cricketers. Theres a tendency to think, hes a legend, and hes a legend, so they ought to know. But thats not necessarily the case in life.If a ten-year-old kid today grows up and in eight years time believes, wham, bam, thank you very much, youve got to score off every ball, and youve got to hit across the line - not everyone is going to be Adam Gilchrist.The MCG has been the axle of my life now for 40-plus years. I started life as an apprentice painter, as a student of architecture, and painted the 40,000 seats there and worked in the old scoreboard, which is now the Jack Fingleton scoreboard at Manuka Oval. I ran the total on that, painted the seats, then was a commentator on cricket and football on TV and radio.I go to the MCG so much even these days, to speak at conferences or launches. Its great to be able to look out the window and unlock a filing cabinet of memories. ' ' '