Jazz lose Game 1 to Spurs 106-91

- The San Antonio Spurs have the best record in the West for a reason.

- Armchair-quarterbacking, I don't think it was smart to move Josh Howard into the starting line-up. Sure, he's a better player than DeMarre Carroll, but Carroll in the starting lineup is what helped the Jazz end the regular season on a five-game win streak. Howard missed all four of his shots and had two turnovers in 16 minutes. He has playoff experience up the yin-yang, but he's been injured and they need to reintegrate him more slowly. I'd bring him off the bench for Game 2.

- Al Jefferson did a decent job on Tim Duncan, who at times played like the Timmy of old. Al finished with 16 and 9 while Duncan had 17 and 11. The default criticism of Big Al tends to be his defense, and it is a weakness, but no one outside of Derrick Favors played decent defense last night.

- As a Jazz fan, I miss the days when Deron Williams would neutralize Tony Parker. Devin Harris is not as capable. Tony Parker seemed to get whatever he wanted.

- This is the first playoff game of Tyrone Corbin's career. I'm sure he'll learn from this. I just wonder why the big front court line-up of Millsap/Favors/Jefferson didn't make an appearance until the third quarter. Maybe he was saving it, surprise the Spurs with it.

- Gordon Hayward was 12-12 from the free-throw line. I love that. And upon further reflection, hayward had a nice defensive game too. Ginobili wound up shooting 3-10 from the field.

- The Jazz had 16 turnovers.  The Spurs only had 10.

- In Game 2, I'd love to see DeMarre Carroll start, and about seven minutes in, sub him out for Derrick Favors.  Play Harris, Hayward, Millsap, Favors, Jefferson.  Beginning of the second, go to Tinsley, Burks, Howard, Favors, Kanter, see how that goes.

Jazz Are Playoff-Bound!

They're in, they're in, they're in!

So happy for Al Jefferson.  Happy for the other guys too, but it seems something special for him.

Jazz beat Magic in OT 117-107

Some thoughts on the Jazz win:

- For the first time in his career, Al Jefferson may go to the playoffs.  Yes, I could say the same thing about Gordon Hayward, Derrick Favors, etc., but Al's been in the league a while and his stints with the pre-KG Celtics and post-KG TimberWolves were exericses in futility.  He thought he'd get when he was traded to the Jazz last year, but a Sloan retirement and D-Will trade killed that possibility.  Now the Jazz are 34-30 and in the 8th spot with only two more games to play.

- Al continues to be great on offense and weak on defense.  Yeah, Big Al gets his blocked shots, but his guy can often get those points back.  He had 21 points tonight; Glen Davis had 17.  The good thing about Al is he usually does outscore his guy, but it means other teammates had better be shutting their man down.

- The starting five dropped the ball in the first quarter, and Orlando also had a 15-0 run in the third.  But coach Ty Corbin went to his big three lineup early (Millsap, Favors, Jefferson all on floor at same time) and it paid off.  I love seeing that Derrick Favors had 36 minutes of playing time tonight (hence his 16 points and 11 rebounds). I am a believer that Favors would regularly be a 16-10 guy if he had the minutes.

- Orlando's one of the best 3-point shooting teams in the league and with no Dwight Howard they greatly relied on it.  And since the Jazz are one of the worst at defending the 3, it was a perfect storm.  The Magic were 15-38 from 3.  My counter stat for that is that the Jazz scored 62 points in the paint.

- Paul Millsap had 18 and 9.  If he'd had one more rebound, it would have meant he, Favors and Jefferson all would've had double-doubles.

- Jamaal Tinsley was crucial in getting the Jazz back in the game in the first half.  He wound up with 9 assists in 18 minutes.  Devin Harris had 7 assists.

- A win washes away many sins, and Harris & Gordon Hayward had their problems.  Hayward had 6 turnovers but he had a clutch 3 late in the game that kept the Jazz in it and allowed them to get it to overtime.  Harris was aggressive with the ball and ended up with 21 points.  He also had the game-saving block on Jameer Nelson as time ran out in regulation.

- Enes Kanter looked good in his 12 minutes.  He had 9 points and 2 rebounds.

- Jazz bench outscored Magic bench 39-10.

Jazz beats Mavericks in triple-overtime

My eight-year-old Evan loves watching Jazz games with me, probably more than any other child right now. I've taken my oldest two to Jazz games, but when I was able to get tickets for last night's Dallas Mavericks game, I figured it was a good time for him to have his first live game experience. And my record's on the line. The Jazz are 22-1 when I attend, dating back to 1990. That loss came to the Thunder when Russell Westbrook outplayed Deron Williams.

So the Jazz have been the walking wounded lately, with Josh Howard, Raja Bell, CJ Miles and Earl Watson all out. Jeremy Evans was available to play but he never made it into the game. DeMarre Carroll went from a 10-day contract to the starting lineup, and Blake Ahearn has this John Crotty thing going for him that will probably results in him sticking around the rest of the season.

The Jazz's playoff hopes are in the balance. Duh-duh-DUHMMMMM!

We had nosebleed seats, but I took us down a few rows and no one ever showed up to say those were their seats.

Some game observations:

- Devin Harris has played much more freely now that he feels he has the greenlight to shoot three's. Or maybe it's just the comfort of being on a team again that has playoff hopes. Those dark Nets days couldn't have been good for the psyche.

- The Mavs kept Jason Kidd glued to Gordon Hayward. I know GH ended up with 24 points, but it took him 54 minutes to get there. Kidd did a good job of crowding GH and not letting his teammates pass to him. Kidd only had 4 steals, 3 of which were errant Jazz passes.

- Paul Millsap had the defensive assignment on Dirk Nowitzki most of the night, and all the effort was there, but Dirk's five inches taller, and Sap couldn't do anything to stop him. All he could do was make it difficult.

- Dirk got a couple big boos when he barrelled right through DeMarre Carroll, and the refs called Carroll for the foul.

- Delonte West is a knucklehead. After a foul was called, he walked over to Hayward and gave him a wet willie, and like pro-wrestling refs, none of them saw it. The crowd reaction was so strong, the refs said, "Huh, we should go to the monitors and review something." The crowd started chanting "Throw him out!" but he only got a technical. West got booed every time he touched the ball for the rest of the night.

- Jazz fans love their rookies, but Alec Burks was 0-6 tonight.

- Al Jefferson was an offensive beast. 28 points, 26 rebounds. He ate Brendan Haywood and Ian Mahinmi alive. The Mavs seemed to have a game-plan of triple-teaming Big Al early, but Al's learned to pass back out, and Harris and Hayward were hitting their 3's.

- I was cheering for the Mavericks to win last year.  I have a Mavs championship hat my son bought me.  Mavs put up a good fight, but they also reminded me of why I like cheering against Dirk, the way he flails his arms like a wounded stork, the way he storms like a giraffe in a china shop to draw contact.  He and Manu Ginobili have that in common, cept Dirk's a lot taller.  If the Finals were a Mavs-Heat rematch, I think I'd have to cheer for the Heat.

- Very proud of all five guys in the starting line-up.

- There are still times I wish coach Corbin would put Favors in more for defensive posessions, as he is the best big-man defender on the team, but Corbin's still feeling his way as a head coach. This coming off-season is going to be the first real off-season where he can plan all year, and we can get an idea of what he can really do.

- After the game, Evan was able to get a high-five from Big Al.



Other stuff:

- I can't imagine head-coach Mark Jackson is happy with what his owner and GM are doing to his team.  If the Warriors don't end in the bottom seven, as in the top seven of the lottery, they lose their first-round pick (to the Jazz, hence my focus).  So from the trade deadline on, they've been doing everything they can to tank the season.  Blatantly, openly, shamelessly.  They shut down David Lee with a "groin strain."  Richard Jefferson now has right-knee tankinitis (I read that on Twitter, sorry I don't remember who coined it).  The starting five for the Golden State Warriors last night were Charles Jenkins, Klay Thompson, Dorell Wright, Jeremy Tyler and Mickell Gladness.  How can you charge fans money to watch that game?  The owner deserved to get booed.  This year.  Maybe Andrew Bogut and Steph Curry will be restored to full health next year and they'll be brilliant.  But Grantland's historical takedown of the Warriors is the best write-up I've seen on that poor fanbase.

- I have to figure if the Clippers make it out of the first round of the playoffs that Vinny Del Negro's job is safe.  Pat Riley's not the GM there, so yeah, he ought to be good.  I just see how the Clips destroyed the Thunder defensively in the second half.

- The Jazz are now only a half-game behind the Suns and Rockets for the eighth spot, and the Jazz have the easiest row to hoe ahead of them of the three.  The Jazz play the Dwight-less Magic and the Suns at home, and they have a home-and-away with the Blazers, who have as many wounded players as the Jazz, but one of them's LaMarcus Aldridge.

- Whoever gets the eighth spot will likely be swept by the Spurs, but hey, the #1 Western seed has lost before, and playoff experience is playoff experience.