The Utah Jazz are no strangers to inconsistency. In fact, trying to be more consistent has been something that both Donovan Mitchell and Rudy Gobert have preached since they left the NBA bubble.
But just two games into the 2020-21 regular season, we’re already seeing signs of inconsistency. After a dynamic and commanding win on the road in Portland to kick off the season, the Jazz returned home and fell flat against the Minnesota Timberwolves on Saturday night.
“We would much rather come out with a W and not have to learn our lessons this way, in this fashion but we’ve got to understand that teams are going to come out and give us their best shot night in and night out,” Mike Conley said. “We can’t take that for granted. You have to come with a better sense of urgency from the tip.”
The Timberwolves didn’t seem to have the same problem. After a win over the Pistons to open their season, they came into Utah, one of the few arenas that can boast about a limited fan presence, and made life tough on the Jazz.
Never wavering from their game plan, the T’wolves dictated the contest and worked from a defense-first position.
“I think one of the best things we did today was just our game plan discipline,” Karl-Anthony Towns said. “We really did a great job of sticking to what we wanted them to shoot, letting them shoot the shot spectrum that we had for them that would fall in our favor. We just did a great job being disciplined, being tough. Even when things kind of looked sideways or anything, we stepped up.”
That early defensive punch from Minnesota seemed to take the Jazz by surprise, but rather than regroup, Utah continued to flounder through most of the game, giving up 19 turnovers for 26 points and shooting just 38.3% overall and 29.4% from beyond the arc.
“Minnesota was the more aggressive team,” Jazz head coach Quin Snyder said. “I thought in the first half they just ran and defended, and we didn’t do either of those things.”
The Jazz staged a bit of a comeback, but were never able to put together any kind of substantial run. Minnesota would either clamp down and put together a run of their own — largely in transition off of Utah turnovers — or with head coach Ryan Saunders calling a timeout to keep the Jazz from gaining any momentum or rhythm.
In having such contrasting kinds of performances in the first two games of the season, the Jazz are hoping that their loss and overall lack of effort against the Timberwolves can serve as an early lesson.
None of the players would admit to playing down to the competition or underestimating the abilities of Minnesota, but they did admit that there was maybe some unearned confidence from the win against Portland.
“Tonight, maybe we felt like we didn’t have to come out as physical, as locked in,” Gobert said. “We had many of those games last year, and it’s good that we have one now because I feel like we’re going to realize that we need to come out with the same intensity, same urgency.”
The Jazz aren’t going to be a perfect team, and this season is going to be hard. There are going to be nights when they just don’t have it on the offensive end. Saturday’s game was a stark reminder that even when the shots aren’t falling, they can’t let go of their defensive principles.
“The games where we don’t have the legs, we’ve got to have the mind,” Gobert said. “We’ve got to be tough mentally.”
It’s likely the same story that you’ve heard before and the same explanations from the players. Inconsistency is something that the Jazz have struggled with for years. It’s one of the habits they’ll need to break if they want to be considered a legitimate contender.
They’ve got 70 more games to prove they’ve learned their lesson, with the next one coming up on Monday in Oklahoma City.
from Deseret News https://ift.tt/38KvWSC
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