After being an afterthought in Luka Doncic’s Lakers debut earlier this week, the Jazz stole the show in Wednesday’s sequel.
A balanced scoring attack and explosive third quarter pushed Utah past Doncic, LeBron James and company in 131-119 fashion at the Delta Center, earning arguably the season’s most satisfying victory for the rebuilding Jazz.
“That’s a really good bounce back win,” Jazz head coach Will Hardy told reporters after the game. “The couple of things that were covered in shoot around and on the defensive side of the ball I thought improved drastically tonight. I thought our overall effort, tenacity and competitiveness, and just kind of a fly-around factor, was way different than it was in the last game.
“… I thought we dictated the tempo of tonight’s game,” Hardy continued. “It always makes you feel good when the team shows the ability to learn and bounce back. There’s going to be nights that don’t go our way, but the way they approached tonight’s game is the piece that I’m most proud of.”
Holding an eight-point advantage at halftime, the Jazz exploded for a 24-4 run across a five-and-a-half-minute span in the third quarter to all but bury Los Angeles. Utah’s energy and hustle flummoxed the sleepwalking, All-Star break-ready Lakers, who couldn’t buy a basket nor keep up with the Jazz in transition.
“At that point, everything (was working),” Jazz center Walker Kessler said. “We were getting out and running in transition, attacking the rim, shooting well, playing good defense and getting stops. I think with our team we’re at our strongest when we’re getting stops and just getting out in transition. We’ve got a lot of young guys that can run really well, so continuing to work on that will be good for us.”
Additionally, the Jazz employed some new zone schemes defensively that gave the Lakers trouble on their offensive end. Only scoring 22 paint points through three quarters definitely hurt L.A., as Kessler locked down the post with six blocks on the evening.
“As a staff, we felt like this time of year is a good time to bring the zone back into the fold some,” Hardy said of his team’s defensive game plan. “It keeps everybody’s brains sharp. It kind of kick-starts your brain again, it’s something totally different. It was kind of a feeling of monotony where you’re just repeating the same things over and over again about man, and the zone really ultimately comes down to communication and problem solving and scrambling. There are some rules, but there’s also situations where it requires the players to really communicate and solve those problems.”
Utah’s guard trio of Jordan Clarkson, Isaiah Collier and Keyonte George was flat out brilliant, accounting for a combined 51 points, 23 rebounds, 26 assists and just six total turnovers.
Against superstars Doncic and James, it was the Jazz’s own former All-Star Lauri Markkanen who made the most noise, scoring 32 points with five rebounds, three steals, six made 3-pointers and a number of epic dunks for good measure.
John Collins added 17 points and eight rebounds, while Walker Kessler posted 16 points with another eight boards in addition to his excellent rim protection.
Doncic and James enjoyed a few flashes of just how good their pairing can be moving forward, teaming up for 34 points, 11 assists and 10 rebounds, but also coughing up eight turnovers against Utah’s inspired defense.
With just under eight minutes remaining in the contest and down by 22, Los Angeles essentially waved the white flag by putting Bronny James on the floor, only for LeBron’s son to scrap together a career-high nine points — with the Delta Center crowd erupting each time he touched the ball — to help make the Lakers’ final deficit appear more respectable.
With the win, the Jazz now move to 13-40 on the season with one contest left before the All-Star break. While Utah’s campaign has seen far more lows than highs, Hardy credited his team for strengthening its overall resilience amid the continued trials.
“The players deserve all the credit,” Hardy said. “They’re all tough, they’re all smart, they’re all really good human beings, they’re good teammates, they’re respectful people, they have humility, they take coaching, they take ownership of the things that they need to do better. We don’t have a group that points fingers, we don’t have a group that complains out of their breath … But they deserve all the credit because ultimately the character of the group is a, you know, a summation of all their characters individually.”
