LOS ANGELES — The Los Angeles Lakers threw a basketball party in Game 6, and the Memphis Grizzlies were the piñata, broken as part of the celebration.

This party had it all.

It had Dr. Dre on the soundtrack and in the front row. It had a guest list of 19,000 strong, with glow sticks as party favors. It had the now rarely seen Jack Nicholson, a front-row Lakers fixture during both the Showtime and Shaq & Kobe eras, returning to his courtside perch for the first time in nearly two years. And it had a 40-point win and dominant performances from two future Hall of Famers in LeBron James and Anthony Davis.

This Grizzlies season ended early Friday night in Los Angeles and then it felt like it just kept on ending, over and over again, until the score was finally 125-85 when the buzzer sounded and this Memphis playoff ride was abruptly over.

Grizzlies season ends in blowout loss to Lakers

I think it first ended midway through the second quarter, when James trucked three Grizzlies defenders on the way to the rim for a bucket and foul to give the Lakers a 19-point lead. 

It ended again a couple of minutes later, when the whole building boogied on the Dance Cam, Jack and Dre were flashed on the screen and a lusty “Brooks You Suck” chant erupted even though its target, Dillon Brooks, had made as many shots (two) as any of his teammates. 

It ended in the final minute of the first half, when James (wait, isn’t he old?) whooshed past young Grizzlies David Roddy and Santi Aldama for a dunk-contest-worthy two-hand reverse. 

It ended early in the second half, when Lakers role players D’Angelo Russell and Jarred Vanderbilt made three straight unanswered 3-pointers and then again, a couple of minutes later, the Grizzlies now down 23, when Davis ripped Aldama’s shot attempt out of the air and looked up at fans behind the backboard, shaking his head. 

It ended late in the third quarter, the Grizzlies now down 32, when the man who’d dominated much of the series took a seat to loud “A-D! A-D!” chants.

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It definitely ended with nine minutes still left on the game clock, when the Grizzlies waved a white towel via a changing of the juniors, Jaren Jackson Jr. out and rookie Kenneth Lofton Jr. in, even though Grizzlies starters had to sit and watch the game keep on ending for what felt like forever. (“Yeah, that was brutal,” Jackson said later.)

It ended with five minutes left, when even Nicholson hit the exits and restless Laker fans began chanting toward the Grizzlies’ bench, “We Want Brooks.”

I don’t think they meant in free agency. I sure hope they didn’t mean for a postgame media session, which Brooks dipped out on for a third straight loss.

I guess it finally ended for good seconds before Grizzlies coach Taylor Jenkins sat down for his postgame press availability, in a room separated by cinder block from the Lakers locker room. There, a “Whoop That Trick” chant and loud laughter could be heard. 

Or maybe Game 6 in Los Angeles ended during Game 5 in Memphis, when bench shooter Luke Kennard crashed into a couple of Lakers and injured his shoulder. 

Box score: Lakers 125, Grizzlies 85

It felt like the Grizzlies had finally — and perhaps belatedly — found something in Game 5 in pairing Kennard with Ja Morant and Desmond Bane, in spaced-out lineups that had Jackson at center. 

And then, as soon as they found it, they lost it. 

We’ll never know, of course.

The Grizzlies were one high-arching LeBron layup away from winning Game 4 in Los Angeles, even though Kennard played only 14 minutes in that one. And there’s no guarantee his presence would have flipped Game 6. In fact, it seems unlikely. The 40-point loss was the worst playoff defeat in franchise history. 

Kennard’s floor-spacing as a shooting threat seemed to accrue the aura of a kind of superpower in the minds of Grizzlies fans in the two days between Games 5 and 6. 

Kennard was listed as “questionable” right up until the moment of decision, but that felt like a tease, or perhaps some gamesmanship. The mood at shootaround that morning suggested Kennard was unlikely to be able to play. 

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Losing him was a too familiar feeling for the Grizzlies. 

At the same shootaround, a not-from-Memphis reporter had asked Jackson about the litany of things that had gone wrong for the team “since March.” Jackson interjected: “Steve.” 

That was January, pointedly, when starting center Steven Adams suffered what ended up being a season-ending knee injury. Adams’ loss — along with that of injured backup Brandon Clarke — was acutely felt once the Grizzlies drew a matchup with a healthy and committed Davis. 

“A big part of this series was rebounding and before (Adams) went out, he was pretty much the best rebounder in the league,” Morant said after the game. 

No Adams, no Clarke, no Kennard. 

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Beyond the off-court dramas, both serious and fleeting, this team found itself finally fighting for its playoff life without three of its eight best players, on a roster that already had less proven deep-bench options than it had the year before.

It went to battle against perhaps the most athletically gifted center in the game, minus both its starter and backup at the position. 

With Morant and Bane needing space to operate, the backcourt attacked Game 6 without the two teammates whose specialties most help create that space. Without Adams, whose brick wall screens slash narrow but effective openings even in tight defenses. Without Kennard, whose shooting gravity opens up expanses of hardwood.

These absences weren’t an excuse for the Grizzlies’ first-round exit, but part of the reason. 

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Not even that could account for a 40-point blowout. 

At the same availability earlier in the day, Jackson had said the team was playing angry the previous couple of games. For whatever reason, they couldn’t summon that again in Game 6. 

And there was no anger on display after this one either. More exhaustion, resignation and, peaking out on the horizon, a hint of determination. 

If this series was a disappointment, it was also clarifying and confirming. 

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It was the third playoffs for the Morant-era Grizzlies, but the first with the team’s inner core fully formed: Morant, Jackson and Bane. Ages 23, 23 and 24, respectively. Each with at least one 30-point game in this series.

Privately and publicly, from decision-makers to the players, everyone acknowledges that this team is now, at root, about the union of these three players. 

“We’ve got three years of playoff experience now, so I think that we need to lead the charge,” said Bane.

“We’re the leaders. We have to cherish our relationship with each other and cherish what we have as a team and just take it seriously,” said Jackson. 

There was a lot of talk about “maturity” during this series, but the Grizzlies’ issues are about more than just locker-room leadership. People like to admonish the Grizzlies for brash talk, but colorful quotes didn’t miss open jumpers or get out-rebounded. 

The Grizzlies’ path forward starts with its three young stars improving both off and on the floor. 

Jackson was Defensive Player of the Year, but he wasn’t Defensive Player of This Series. That was Davis. 

Bane and Morant had some great games, but also some negligible ones. They combined to shoot 8-32 in the finale. 

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“Everybody add something to your game and everybody grow, then come back and put it together. That’s it. That’s all you can do,” said Jackson.

Morant may have ducked out on a media session earlier in the series, but wasn’t ducking anything as the series ended.

“I’ve got to be better with my decision-making. Off-court issues affected us as an organization,” he said. “Being a leader of this team starts with me. How I attack any situation, I know my guys will follow. I’ve just got to be better.”

Perhaps these past four seasons, starting with Morant’s rookie campaign and a one-game trip to the play-in tournament, have been a kind of phase one of the Morant-era Grizzlies.

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Assuming an early contract extension for Bane is coming this summer, the team will enter phase two with three complementary young stars locked in on the books and established on the floor. They will also enter it with more warranted pressure to put a team around them that can not only navigate a regular season but be a tougher out in the playoffs. 

“We’re gonna grow. We’re gonna get older. Things are going to come as that happens,” Jackson said. 

They’re also going to need some help. 

“The margin for error for us this season was pretty small in my opinion, and we tried to grow through that,” said Jenkins. 

The Grizzlies will enter the summer with 14 of 15 players under contract. 

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Last season, they were the youngest playoff team in a decade. This time, they were just the youngest team in these playoffs. It’s hard to imagine all of those 14 will be back. And the 15th? 

That would be Brooks, who will be a free agent this summer, and whose rough play on the floor and too noisy experiences off of it will almost certainly have a bearing on his future. 

In the end, Jenkins framed a hard ending to a good season as a pivot point for the franchise.

“We’ve had a lot of success in our first three years, and in my opinion, this is probably that moment in time that’s going to be a wake-up call,” said Jenkins. 

“This is a journey … and it’s not supposed to be easy. Any of it. Are we going to take it lightly and take it for granted, or are we going to take a really hard look in the mirror?”