On Tuesday night, however, Williams passed Maravich in Utah's record book.

Williams handed out 15 assists during the Jazz's 128-106 win over Charlotte to overtake the legendary Maravich for fifth place on the franchise's all-time list.

Williams' career total is now 1,852 - eight more than Maravich. He needs 44 to overtake Jeff Hornacek for fourth place, which is likely to happen sometime in the Jazz's final 10 games.

Informed that he had passed Maravich, Williams said, "That's great. I didn't even know I was close. I figured there were a lot of guys ahead of me. But it's definitely special when you pass a guy like Pistol Pete. He's one of the all-time greats."

Asked if he will ever catch John Stockton, who had an NBA-best 15,806 assist during his 19-year career, Williams laughed and said, "I don't think anybody will be beating that record,"

Williams scored five points and had four assists in a 10-minute stretch of the first quarter, when coach Jerry Sloan knew his third-year point guard was focused.

"Deron has been terrific," he said. "He started off the game tonight about as well as you can - playing and trying to execute what we want to do. He's just playing terrific basketball."

Williams finished well, too.

He had six assists in the fourth quarter, when the Bobcats rallied from a 22-point deficit and got within three.

What was Williams thinking when Utah's lead melted to 101-98?

"Oh, crap," he said.

Actually, Williams said, "I don't know what I was thinking - just keep fighting and go on a run, which we did. I thought we did a good job closing them out.

"Kyle [Korver] hit some big shots, we got some stops on 'D' and we got out on some fast breaks. We got the crowd back into it and, once we did that, we were fine."

The Jazz's all-time assists leaders:

1. John Stockton 15,806

2. Karl Malone 5,085

3. Rickey

Green 4,159

4. Jeff Hornacek 1,895

5. Deron Williams 1,852

6. Pete Maravich 1,844

7. Adrian Dantley 1,762

8. Darrell Griffith 1,623

9. Howard Eisley 1,472

10. Andrei Kirilenko 1,376