Utah Jazz Blog

Well, that happened.

The Utah Jazz were able to jump out on the Denver Nuggets by 11 in the first quarter… and then J.R. Smith started raining threes. Smith was the dagger in the side of the Jazz as he dropped 28 points on 8-13 behind the arc… but he was hardly the only problem the Jazz had in this “Monumental” game.

Carlos Boozer, Memo Okur and Andrei Kirilenko were a combined 10 of 45  (22.2%) and Deron Williams had a very marginal game as well (but his stats were somewhat padded at the end of this one).  

According to Deron, “That’s probably the worst 18 points, 10 assists I’ve ever had in my life.”

It is really amazing, actually remarkable, that the Jazz were able to have several chances to cut the lead to 4 in the final minutes of this one. 

Looking back at my preview of the Jazz-Nuggets game yesterday, I mentioned the issues the Jazz have with shot-blocking teams:

Block Party?

One concerning stat is that the Nuggets are second in the NBA with 5.9 blocks per game.  The Jazz (Carlos Boozer in particular) struggle against teams that block shots.  Utah is just 11-12 (.478)  in games versus teams in the top ten teams in blocks.  Conversely, the Jazz are 35-16 (.686) against the rest of the league.  Including the Nuggets game, five of the Jazz final eight opponents are among the top ten in blocks (@Denver, @Dallas, Golden State, L.A. Clippers, @L.A. Lakers).

Hmm… well, Chris “Birdman” Andersen finished with 8 (eight!) blocks on the Jazz and the Nuggets had 10 as a team.   More worrisome than the Nuggets stats is the fact that Carlos Boozer was blocked 6 times himself. 

Carlos seemed to have a HORRIBLE game and the Jazz seemed as though they would be better off without him but looking at the final box-score, the Jazz were +4 with Booze in the game and -22 with Millsap in the game.  Millsap (14 points on 7-10 shooting with 12 boards) along with C.J. Miles and Ronnie Brewer, seemed to be the only Jazz players that had decent games.

• The Jazz started the game very nicely with 3 made jumpers by Ronnie Brewer, a couple of jumpers by C.J. and a nice D-Will dunk. The Jazz were up 22-11 before J.R. Smith hit his first (26 foot) three pointer. 
• The Nuggets outscored the Jazz 10-2 over the last 2 minutes of the first quarter and closed the second quarter on a 19-8 run.
• Deron Williams was called for his 4th foul midway through the third quarter really killing the Jazz chances.  Jerry Sloan didn’t like the call and delivered a bit of a jab at the Nuggets after the game, “They’re cute with the way they play and that’s what happens.” It will be fun if these teams meet in the playoffs, I suspect you would definitely hear more of that quote.

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