The Triple Team: Jazz overcome blooper-reel offense in the first half thanks to solid defense in win vs. Hawks

Three thoughts on the Utah Jazz’s 112-91 win over the Atlanta Hawks from Salt Lake Tribune beat writer Andy Larsen.

1. Rudy Gobert locks down the paint

The Hawks just could not score without Trae Young. DeAndre Hunter and Bogdan Bogdanovic were also missing, but Young is the Hawks’ offensive engine — if he’s hurt, or if he’s playing poorly (as he did in the last Hawks/Jazz meeting) — they’re really going to struggle.

Struggle might be kind. Atlanta only shot 14-35 inside 3 feet of the rim tonight, as Rudy Gobert really just locked everything down. The most-impacted player was Clint Capela, who shot just 3-14 on the night, which is really hard to do given how close his shots are to the rim.

But Gobert made life tough on Capela.

Capela obviously wasn’t the only victim here. Gobert and Favors also changed the shots of Atlanta’s guards and wings driving into the paint. Brandon Goodwin shot 1-10, Rajon Rondo shot 0-7, Danilo Gallinari went 1-6, Cam Reddish shot 5-14... only Kevin Huerter had an okay night with 7-14 shooting.

I like what Favors did here: Gallinari’s known for drawing fouls well, but the Jazzman does everything right here in staying vertical and showing his hands. The result is a wild miss:

I could show you 21 other misses from within the restricted area... or the 4-17 shooting they had elsewhere in the paint. Regardless, these Hawks weren’t at all dangerous offensively — a team with a talent deficit against a stout defense that was ready for action.

Since the Jazz’s winning streak began, the Jazz are outscoring teams by over 20 points per 100 possessions with Gobert on the floor, and the team has a 100.1 defensive rating during those minutes. In the high-octane NBA, that’s really impressive.

2. What changed offensively?

The Jazz were really, really poor in the first half offensively, scoring only 45. But they scored 67 points in the second half. What changed?

This was a point of contention tonight between former Tribune and current Athletic Jazz beat writer Tony Jones and I. His point of view is probably best summed up by this tweet:

I agree that the Hawks were doing a lot to prevent the Jazz’s 3-point attack. They stayed attached to shooters on the perimeter, even forcing them inside off ball rather than get open for threes. And on pick and rolls, the perimeter players didn’t give help, leaving Capela to just sink in the paint.

What I don’t agree with is that midrange floaters were the way out of the Jazz’s jam. Indeed, the Jazz shot just 12-29 from midrange tonight, or 0.8 points per possession. And in fact, there wasn’t an adjustment: the Jazz shot more midrange shots in the first half than they did in the second half. They made 4-7 during the third, which is nice, but only contributed eight points to their 35 in the quarter.

“Whatever they try to do, we always find a way to just adapt and keep getting what we want, which is, you know, the rim and the threes,” Gobert said after the game.

So what was the difference? Well, let’s ask Quin Snyder:

“I didn’t think we ran as much as we needed to in the first half. Those are possessions that we can build on, that just get the ball moving, everybody touches it and we get more catch and shoot threes. We didn’t finish at the rim real well in the first half either,” Snyder said.

“There are times when they’re not going to leave people on the perimeter and we’re going to have the rim, and that’s what we want,” Snyder said. “We had more midrange nonpaint twos tonight than we’ve had in a while. And, you know, if that shot’s the one we have to take, you know, I’ve got confidence in guys shooting it. But I also think the second half, we started getting to the rim, and I’ll say it again, we started finishing at the rim too.”

Snyder did mention the midrange twos there, and gave his permission to his team to shoot them. And that’s fine! But I thought he emphasized the role of transition play and getting all the way — not just halfway — to the rim a lot more.

3. Bloopers!

You know, the Jazz won this game by 21. We’re allowed to laugh at our own team a little bit, right?

Well, the first half was just one of the goofiest displays of basketball I’ve ever seen. And in the spirit of Frank Layden’s Dazzling Dunks and Basketball Bloopers videos from 1989-1990, let’s put the bloopers together in one clip and add some music.

Ah, that was definitely worth it. Well, they got their act together in the second half, right?