Utah Jazz came to tonight’s game in absolute fire. They brought the drums one more time tonight and defeated last year’s Eastern Conference champions, the Miami Heat, defeating them for their 7th straight win. There are 18 wins in 17 games for those who count at home. Let’s revisit some thoughts, highlights and comments from the game.
The game started very slow for Jazz. This is the first time in a while that it looked like an opposing defense was actually generating stops against the high-powered attack. The switches were not creating open or incompatible shots and Jazz had only 2 points in the first 5 minutes or more. It got a little worse before getting better, but Bojan Bogdanovic had seen enough and forced a Miami timeout with the game 13-8. Ball three just didn’t land on the first, shooting from 1 to 12 in the fourth. That meant a 21-18 deficit after one. Consider how bad they played, it could have been much worse.
The second quarter was the typical back and forth between 2 good teams. Bogdanovic was showing offensive versatility this quarter. He can score at all levels and in many different ways. He’s much more than just a sniper. Side note: I would really like Royce O’Neale to learn not to travel with his fake bomb and drive from the 3-point line.
This was definitely a clash of 2 high-ranking defenders. Neither team really found an offensive pace and it has been a relatively low scoring game so far. Jazz had a 47-42 lead at halftime.
Donovan swayed in the 2nd half. A very fast 7-0 run alone made Miami ask for just a minute and a half for the second half. Jazz jumped to a 12 point lead with that explosion and it looked like they were going to control him the rest of the way. Kindness! Run a 16-0 Jazz race to start the second half. Quin Snyder is a mentor. The Heat was well prepared to take Jazz out of the game. But for sure, in the interval Jazz counterattacked and his attack is clicking anyway.
This was a very disputed game and suddenly the Jazz went up 21. The defense of Jazz is with a good level of championship. They just stifled the Heat this third quarter.
The game was essentially decided even before the 4th period started. The 4th was basically just a formality at this point. Jazz maintained its leadership and kept the train moving.
Choo choo!