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Sarah Todd
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Utah Jazz center Rudy Gobert (27) dunks on the Detroit Pistons in Salt Lake City on Friday, Jan. 21, 2022. | Jeffrey D. Allred, Deseret News
The Jazz have been going through a rough patch, but the schedule is unforgiving and about to get even tougher
SAN FRANCISCO — The Utah Jazz came away with a win on Friday night at Vivint Arena, and even though it was a win over the Detroit Pistons — the team with the second-worst record in the NBA — the Jazz needed it.
Over the last two weeks, the Jazz have lost six of the eight games they’ve played. They’ve dealt with injuries and players in and out of the league’s COVID-19 protocol, and they’ve also dealt with inconsistency on the court as their flaws have been highlighted.
They needed something they could build momentum from as they head into a brutal stretch of the schedule.
“It felt like we hadn’t won in forever the way that we’ve been playing,” Mike Conley said. “That helps just build confidence.”
But the NBA schedule doesn’t care about the struggles of a team.
On Sunday, the Jazz kick off a murderer’s row two-week stretch in which they’ll see the top three teams in the Western Conference, two other Western Conference contenders and the Eastern Conference-leading Brooklyn Nets.
The Jazz’s two-week slugfest starts on Sunday night against the Golden State Warriors, but the Jazz won’t have time to breathe after facing the No. 2 team in the West as they’ll have to turn around and play the second game of a road back-to-back set on Monday against the No. 1 Phoenix Suns.
As the Jazz head back to Utah, the Suns will follow them there, where they’ll face off once again on Wednesday.
“It was a great team win,” Bojan Bogdanovic said after the Jazz’s 111-101 win against the Pistons. “I mean, the situation that we are in right now, it’s great to win a game, especially before this these three important games that are in front of us.”
It’s not just the three games against the Warriors and Suns though. The Jazz will also have games against the Memphis Grizzlies (Jan. 28), the team that supplanted the Jazz for the No. 3 spot in the West, the Minnesota Timberwolves (Jan. 30), the Denver Nuggets (Feb. 2) and the Brooklyn Nets (Feb. 4).
The Jazz have been without Donovan Mitchell for the last two games after he suffered a concussion against the Los Angeles Lakers on Monday, but they’ll be hoping to get him back before they play the Warriors on Sunday.
Outside of Mitchell, the last remaining Jazz player on the injury list is reserve center Hassan Whiteside, who has been in the NBA’s health and safety protocol.
With their roster as close to healthy as it has been in a while, the Jazz aren’t just hoping to survive this stretch of games against the league’s toughest opponents, they’re hoping to flip the script and prove that rough patch they’ve been in is just that — a patch.
“We want to win,” Rudy Gobert said of the slate of upcoming games. “We don’t fear anyone. We are our biggest enemy, ourselves. ... I don’t see any stretch and look at it and think, ‘Oh, it’s going to be rough.’
“We’ve got to make it rough for other people. That’s what we’re trying to do.”
The Jazz tip off against the Warriors at 6:30 p.m. MST on Sunday on NBA TV.
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