While possibly colored by recency bias, a majority of respondents replied to my very-scientific Twitter poll last night that from among the candidates, they least hoped to see the Utah Jazz as the Houston Rockets’ first round opponent come April. Last night, with starters George Hill and Derrick Favors both sidelined, Utah disposed of the Rockets–themselves without Ryan Anderson–yet again, racing out to an early first quarter lead which proved to be the difference. Houston battled back in the second half, outscoring the Jazz in the third quarter, and matching them in the fourth, but it was not enough.
The two teams are an interesting contrast insofar as the evolution of their roster construction. The Jazz have built a young, deep team from the ashes of the Deron Williams era, the trading of whom yielded Derrick Favors. They plucked Gordon Hayward, Dante Exum, Rudy Gobert, and Rodney Hood with first round picks, with Gobert being the late-round gem that put them on this trajectory. They then traded last year’s pick for George Hill. The Jazz’s rise has been years in the making with it all finally coming together this season.
The Rockets, in contrast, have been cobbled together on the fly around the greatness of one transcendent talent. Seven of their major rotation pieces are seeing major minutes for the franchise for the first time this year (Anderson, Capela, Gordon, Dekker, Williams, Harrell, Nene), with Harden, Trevor Ariza, and Patrick Beverley serving as the only lockerroom mainstays.
The Jazz are a contrast in that their best offensive players (Hayward, Hood, Hill, Johnson) are long, rangy wings the likes of whom an older Trevor Ariza can only guard one of at any given moment. Rudy Gobert also poses a significantly greater threat at the rim than, say, Dewayne Dedmon, who James Harden walked all over a few nights before.
The popular reaction will be to look at last night’s loss and blame rebounding and three-point shooting as the culprits, as is usually done. Houston hit only 8 of their 32 3-point attempts (25%) as a team, and got out rebounded 45-31. But they only sacrificed ten offensive boards, and had ten of their own; further, they outscored Utah 50-40 in the paint. I would argue that had their shooters not gone completely cold overall, they probably pull this game out. Eric Gordon was 4-11, Lou Williams was 2-10, Patrick Beverley was 1-7, and Sam Dekker went 1-4. Missing Ryan Anderson also didn’t help, but the Jazz were playing without significant pieces of their own.
Lou Williams is now shooting 20% (19% on 3’s) in averaging 7.8 points in his last four games. Sam Dekker is now shooting 11% on 3’s in March. Both players need to get it turned around. In Dekker’s case, the sophomore forward will likely be trimmed from the rotation come playoff time. That’s unfortunate – when he’s hitting his shots, his speed and athleticism as a power forward really give the team an advantage against second units.
