It’s a pretty good guess that Quin Snyder had a specific word rattling around inside his head late Wednesday night after the Jazz lost by 27 points to Portland. It wasn’t a swear word, although there was probably a 5 p.m. freeway traffic jam of those backed up in there, all bumper to bumper, too. It was a useful word, one he’s uttered all season long, a word the Jazz had best consider and apply, embrace and utilize for the rest of the season if they intend to fill the measure of their potential.
Focus.
It’s something the Jazz lost track of in a dreadful road game against the Blazers, an important contest that didn’t look as though it was important enough to Snyder’s team. But concern over their lack of focus has less to do with one night, and more to do with the elimination of that tendency when it matters most.
They’re generally a good bunch, this Jazz team, but sometimes they don’t listen.
Sometimes, they do. After all, they had won nine of their last 10 games.
But none of that will be worth a single cent, even if the Jazz finish strong during the regular season, and find themselves firmly positioned in the playoffs. If they play the way they did at Moda Center, they won’t last long in that postseason.
If they don’t f-f-f-f-focus.
You saw what happened. The Jazz fell behind early, allowing the Blazers’ talented guard line to blow like a stack of dynamite, sending dirt and crud in every direction. Damian Lillard and CJ McCollum went for what seemed like a thousand points in the first half alone. They were spectacular, and the Jazz trailed by 18 after the initial quarter, 16 after the second. In that first period, Utah’s defense, the heart and soul and pride of the outfit allowed an astounding 45 points. By the end of the half, they yielded 74.
“The game got away from us in the first quarter,” Snyder said. “Defensively, we can’t give up a 45-point quarter. … Collectively, we have to be better defensively.”
That kind of collapse happens to ordinary defensive clubs. It should not happen to the Jazz.
“It wasn’t any one thing,” said Snyder. “It was us [needing to be] more dialed in competitively.”
Rudy Gobert may be the best individual defender in the league, having the biggest overall effect on games, but he can’t cover everybody. He cannot blanket the entire court. He cannot make up for porous perimeter D.
You might have thought the Blazers would have struggled a bit on attack, since Jusuf Nurkic, Portland’s talented big man, could not go due to soreness in his knee.
It did not matter. The reason? The Jazz’s lack of focus.
At the start of the third quarter, they clamped down, at least momentarily. They cut the Blazers’ lead to 10, and then …
Boom. They turned the ball over a fistful of times, killing the momentum they belatedly had mustered, following that with shots that clanked all over the gym, and the Blazers avalanched over and through the Jazz, suffocating any hope the visitors had of winning a significant game that might have pushed the Jazz to a 30-22 record, and dropped Portland to 31-21. Instead, those numbers flipped to 29-23 and 32-20.
And an opportunity for the Jazz to climb upward in the Western Conference was fumbled away.
Here’s something that can be concluded, a realization that has become clear about the Jazz this season — if and when they do not play with focus and force, with a kind of determination and even desperation, they are vulnerable.
They are good, but not good enough to scatter and coast. Not against the better teams in the West. Not against the opponents they will face in the postseason, if they qualify. That may be true for most teams, but it’s especially the case with the Jazz.
Some observers claim turnovers and other bits of sloppy play aren’t really all that important, all that damaging. But they are. Not just numerically. They are one manifestation of the absence of the very thing Snyder so often calls for.
Yeah. The F-word.
It’s a word that will transform into more than just an expletive if the Jazz don’t find and keep it. It will symbolize a crippling deficiency, a weakness, a periodic inclination they cannot abide.
Sure, it’s the regular season. Blips and bad nights happen. Snyder said his guys must let this miserable performance go, discovering another use of the F-word, saying: “We have to continue to focus forward.”
But they have to remember it, too, so as not to allow it to be repeated. They must play with a purpose, particularly at that defensive end, even, no especially, when their shots aren’t falling, when good things aren’t coming their way.
“Our guys know,” Snyder said. “They know what we need to do … to do at a higher level.”
For their own sakes, and for their successful future, they effing better.
GORDON MONSON hosts “The Big Show” with Jake Scott weekdays from 3-7 p.m. on 97.5 FM and 1280 AM The Zone.
