Dallas @ Utah preview
Delta Center
Last Meeting ( Dec 25, 2021 ) Dallas 116, Utah 120
Despite winning six of seven games, the Utah Jazz did not like the momentum they took into the league's intermission.
Blowing a late 12-point lead and losing to a Los Angeles Lakers team finishing without injured Anthony Davis soured a sweet stretch of six straight wins.
"This is an unfortunate way to go into the All-Star break," Jazz coach Quin Snyder said after the 106-101 loss in Los Angeles.
Coincidentally, the Dallas Mavericks -- whom the Jazz play in Salt Lake City on Friday night -- also went into the break with a 6-1 record in their final seven. That included two in a row on the road -- 107-99 at Miami and 125-118 in New Orleans.
Luka Doncic was the hot topic for the Mavericks going into the All-Star festivities. Doncic scored 49 with 15 rebounds against the Pelicans. That capped a terrific 10-game run in which he averaged 35.4 points, 10.3 rebounds and 9.8 assists.
"Luka set the tone early and often," Dallas coach Jason Kidd said. "We can sit here and talk about him all day. The things that he does on the court for himself and his teammates is incredible. We've used every noun and adjective to describe his game. He just gets better."
Doncic, who scored at least 45 in three of the past four games, was Jazz center Rudy Gobert's opponent in Sunday's All-Star Game. He scored eight for Team LeBron, while Gobert had six points for Team Durant on three dunks, including a surprising 360 slam. (Donovan Mitchell, who was on Team LeBron, was a late scratch with a non-COVID-19 illness.)
They're back to being NBA foes with a mutual goal -- earning a top-four seed and home-court advantage in the playoffs. The Jazz, who won the first matchup this season 120-116, are currently in fourth place in the Western Conference, 1 1/2 games ahead of the fifth-place Mavericks.
"The first game after the break is always super important. We've got to try to continue doing the things we've been doing good and improve on the things we've been trying to improve on since before the break," Dwight Powell told Mavs.com. "We're going up against a great team (Utah) with a lot of weapons and a lot of defensive capabilities, so I think it's a good way to come off the bat and have that challenge."
Utah hopes Los Angeles was not a preview of issues to plague them leading up to the postseason. But it was the 10th time the Jazz lost after blowing a 10-point lead.
"We've done a lot of good things the past two to three weeks. We've got some work to do as a group," Mitchell said. "But I think we can look back, especially the past month, even though January was rough, and say, ‘OK, like, we can really do some things.' A night like tonight, it's discouraging."
The Jazz will need Gobert and Mitchell to be on the same page. They've downplayed reports and rumors that their locker room chemistry issues are serious or a threat to title aspirations.
"It starts at me and big fella," Mitchell said in a podcast with Yahoo. "If we want to ultimately win a championship, it's going to start with us."
--Field Level Media