Utah Jazz: True team effort lifts Jazz
Starters, bench players have big roles in victory
If the Jazz get a little something from as many as they did in Tuesday night's 128-106 win at EnergySolutions Arena — including, but hardly limited to, double-doubles from Deron Williams, Carlos Boozer and Mehmet Okur — they should be just fine, no matter what the circumstances.
"You know," said Williams, who finished with 14 points and a game-high 15 assists, "it's kind of weird sometimes; it's either one or two of us. But it's very rare that it's three players."
And it is even less frequent that the list of contributors is as lengthy as it was against the Bobcats, who were opening a Western-swing stretch with four road games in five nights and are in the midst of playing 10-of-11 away from home.
Yes, All-Star Boozer recorded his 48th double-double of the season, scoring a game-high 28 points and pulling down a game-high 13 rebounds.
And, yes, Okur was in his 2006-07 All-Star form, scoring 20, shooting 7-of-13 of the field, recording 10 boards and impressing so much — especially in light of an illness that drained him just last week — that Williams was willing to offer a rather unconventional suggestion for the future.
But, no, it wasn't just those three who had a hand in Utah's victory — one which leaves the Northwest Division-leading Jazz with the very same record, 47-25, that it had after 72 games last season, and with an NBA-best 31-4 record at home.
There was Andrei Kirilenko, who sparked the Jazz response after Charlotte — which went into the fourth down 92-72 — made it a three-point game at 101-98 with two free throws from 26-point team-high scorer Jason Richardson with 6:15 to go.
Sixteen-point scorer Kirilenko answered on the Jazz's next possession by thinking better of jacking up a trey try and instead slicing to the basket for a nifty layup, igniting a game-closing 28-8 run.
"It was a great move to the hoop," Williams said. "Strong. He took it up strong."
There was Kyle Korver, who hit 3-of-4 from 3-point range in the fourth quarter alone, the first make coming after Boozer rebounded the miss of a free throw that resulted from Kirilenko's drive.
When Korver hit his third trey with 3:17 left, the Jazz lead was up to 12 at 116-104.
"Kyle made some big shots," said Jazz coach Jerry Sloan, whose club is now 3-1 in a five-game homestand that concludes with Friday night's game against the Los Angeles Clippers. "It kind of broke their back."
"Kyle got hot," Boozer added. "He started cooking in that fourth quarter, and we kept trying to look for him. When he's rolling, we want to find his hot hand — and that's what happened."
There was Matt Harpring, whose 18 points off the bench were a season-high. There was Paul Millsap, who had what Boozer called "two real beasty blocks." And there was Ronnie Brewer, who was credited with a game-high four steals.
"Ronnie," said Williams, whose double-double was his 45th of the season, "played great D in the second half and forced a lot of steals, a lot of turnovers."
By the time the Jazz advantage was back in the 20s in the final minute, even Bobcats coach Sam Vincent was moved to heap praise on what truly was a total team effort.
"They just play so tough," Vincent said of the Jazz, who are now just 2 1/2 games out of first place in the NBA's Western Conference — yet also are only three games up on the conference's eighth-place club, Golden State.
"They just play physical," Vincent added. "They play aggressive, they hit you, they bang you, they beat you, and mentally you've got to be tough to play these guys here, because they're going to wear on you through the course of a game."
E-mail: tbuckley@desnews.com
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