Three thoughts on the Jazz’s 132-105 loss against the Portland Trail Blazers from Salt Lake Tribune beat writer Andy Larsen.
1. A combination of bad defense and great Portland shooting seals it
When you give up 45 points in the first quarter, you’re probably going to have a bad time.
It started with just Blazer brilliance: Damian Lillard and C.J. McCollum hitting tough shots. Like, this is just a tough shot to make:
That was Lillard knocking one down, but McCollum’s shots to start weren’t easy either: shots he’s capable of making, but you wouldn’t exactly bet on him to make all of them, would you?
Well, he did, scoring 20 points in the quarter on 9-9 shooting.
But then I thought the Jazz’s defense actually did get worse, maybe due to just sheer resignation. Like, Ricky Rubio can’t get beaten this easily.
This was the Blazers' shot chart in the quarter, and that’s a lot of green from nearly all over.
(NBA.com)
Then they started to foul in the second quarter, helping Lillard 15 points overall in the second and 24 in the half. And in the third, the Blazers got every loose ball and scored on every Jazz turnover, stretching a 10-point lead to 27 in a hurry.
When you’re down 27, the fourth quarter synopsis doesn’t matter.
“We weren’t playing the right way. Offensively, we were getting whatever we wanted to. We were shooting 52 percent after the first quarter,” Jae Crowder said. “They were shooting 75. It’s tough to do anything good when you’re letting someone shoot 70 percent from the start of the game. That was the message: These guys had it very, very easy from the start of the game.”
Is it a long-term issue to be worried about? I think there are fair concerns about the defense of the Jazz’s guards: Rubio’s best as a team defender, but he can get cooked occasionally one-on-one, Donovan Mitchell’s impact is on and off (somewhat dependent on the offensive load he has to carry), and Royce O’Neale isn’t having the on-ball impact he did last season. They definitely miss Dante Exum here, too.
2. Grayson Allen gets a chance
The Jazz did cut the Blazers lead to 10, with some really nice play from Mitchell at the beginning of the third. But then turnovers — two by Rubio, one by Mitchell — led Quin Snyder to make a surprise early substitution in the second half, putting Grayson Allen in for some non-garbage time minutes.
“I mean, we just gave up a 45-point quarter, so everybody’s got to be ready,” Snyder explained after the game. “We just look for a way to find something that guys can dig in on and play better and wanted to give him a chance to help the team.”
Allen did score 10 points, but it took him 11 shots. On the defensive end, he was not the answer. He gave up this dunk:
And then this flagrant foul lead to a 5-point play that basically sealed it. He’s actually in decent enough defensive position here to maybe get a block, but then raises his forearm into the charging opponent in a dangerous way.
This is a really ill-advised, difficult-to-control bounce pass, and then Allen takes the intentional foul with the team already in the penalty.
I actually do like Allen’s quick trigger from distance that makes him a threat the defense has to consider. But defensively, he still has much to learn. And that makes it two points in a row in this Triple Team: man, this team misses Dante Exum.
3. Pushing the pace, even after makes
After bucket after bucket went in for Portland tonight, Quin Snyder kept telling his team to inbound the ball quickly and push the ball up the court. This is even one of the more lax times he was gesturing it, but one of the only ones caught on camera.
Why did Quin think it was important to go faster?
“I felt like when we were taking the ball out of the net so much, if we could get the ball up the floor quicker, it was more about having the mindset. I wanted that mindset to translate to our defense,” Snyder said. “I just wanted us to try to attack.”
Even when you’re taking the ball out of the net, pushing might accidentally lead to a mismatch that you can take advantage of. You can push the ball forward without necessarily taking the first shot, but going early means that you have more time to run actions and read and react. Going slowly, though, means that the defense definitely has the chance to get set.
It also gives the defense more of a chance to read a play call and react, knowing what’s coming. In the fourth game against a team in five weeks, that might be important.
“I talked to the team during shootaround today, we should know some of their calls by now,” Portland coach Terry Stotts said before the game. But if you can get the ball up the court quickly, they may not have the ability to check where their man is and look at Snyder or Rubio for the play call.
