Watch: Ja Morant pushes grinning LeBron James after reverse dunk closes Grizzlies' loss

The Memphis Grizzlies were severely undermanned Friday night, but the collection of players on 10-day and two-way contracts had the ball, down by three points against LeBron James, Anthony Davis and the star-studded Lakers.

But James stole the ball from Jack White, drove toward the basket and executed a reverse dunk that effectively ended the game. He finished near the Grizzlies bench, right in the face of Ja Morant, who was standing up alongside the rest of the injured players.

Morant pushed him away as James backpedaled, grinning. The dunk put the Lakers up by five points and sealed a critical win in their push to get a higher seed in the Western Conference play-in tournament.

The Grizzlies were eliminated from playoff contention a long time ago in a season that was completely derailed by injuries to nearly every key player. Morant played only nine games, while Desmond Bane and Marcus Smart also missed extended periods of time after the new year.

Still, Memphis has competed in plenty of games against teams that have come in as heavy favorites. That was the case on Friday, when the Lakers were favored by 15.5 points but just eked out the win. Lakers guard Austin Reaves said after the game that he knew it'd be a tough game at the onset.

"You could tell, just with the way that they were carrying themselves earlier in the game, that they believed that they should be in the game and you tip your hat when you see guys like that really going and taking control of the game," he said. "Memphis is going to be in a really good spot next year."

Reach sports writer Jonah Dylan at jonah.dylan@commercialappeal.com or on Twitter @thejonahdylan.