Through nearly two months of the NBA season, the predicted offensive explosion from the Utah Jazz hasn’t come, yet. The Jazz ranked 22nd in the league offensively through 26 games, nearly a third of the season.

But the last five games were without Mike Conley available, and generally, the Jazz have been worse without him on the floor. Without him, their offensive rating is just 102.9 points per 100 possessions, but with him, they bump up to 107.6 points per 100 possessions.

Orlando Magic coach Steve Clifford, after watching the Jazz on film, thinks that the Jazz will figure it out.

“They have more offense than any other team in the league. We have a lot of offense; they have a ton of offense,” Clifford said. "So they’re super hard to prepare for.”

Clifford said that the Jazz raise flags for opposing coaches, who have to try to get their defenses to adapt.

“(Conley’s return) just gives them another really dynamic pick-and-roll player. So you have, say, Mitchell on one side and Conley on the other side — that’s gonna be a problem,” Clifford said. “They are high-execution, they play with great purpose.”

Ingles stays in starting lineup

Even though Conley’s returned, Joe Ingles kept his position in the starting lineup in Tuesday’s game. Ingles had found more success starting, including a critical 23-point performance against the Minnesota Timberwolves last week.

As a starter, Ingles found pick-and-roll opportunities with Rudy Gobert more frequently, and the two developed a useful connection like that of Ingles and former center Derrick Favors. Keeping Ingles in the starting lineup was apparently a priority, enough to move Royce O’Neale — and his solid perimeter wing defense and shooting — to the bench.

That being said, Jazz coach Quin Snyder thinks that Ingles’ performance with the starters was less about who he played with and more about how he started to play.

“I think it has less to do with Joe playing with Rudy,” Snyder said. “Joe’s mindset changed a little bit because he had the ball in his hands more. So I think he just lost himself in the game.”

Snyder said that Ingles’ early season struggles were like those of Conley’s: As he thought about his new role, he lost a sense of intuitiveness, and that made his play more robotic and less effective. Ingles and Conley both were concerned about how to get their new teammates involved, and were thinking less about how to play their natural games. As the team comes back together, though, Snyder says more time — and practice in recent days — will make things more fluid on the court.

“It’s great to be conscientious of one another," Snyder said. "But I think when you trust each other, the ball will move, and the ball will find the right guy.”