This was the news greeted by fans at 1 AM, as the team is headed to the Lone Star State to wrap up their two-game road trip against the Houston Rockets — wait for it….on National Television! Ever since the Jazz pulled the plug on Operation Jaren, Nurkic hasn’t been able to grace the floor — a combination of DNP-CD and injury report appearances. A devastating loss for those who were eager for another unorthodox Nurkic triple-double, but a win for sickos who wanted to squeeze one or two more losses out of Nurkic’s estimated impact.
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But Houston is one of those teams where you take your loss, bow and leave — or at least in theory. Though they’re 34-21, a Kevin Durant burner account scandal has gone viral, which has only added fuel to the fire amid a 3-4 stretch through All-Star Weekend. They’ve collected a loss and a win against this Jazz group back in a two-game set back in early December. But hey, it’s not all doom and gloom for Ryan Smith’s chosen children. Keyonte George, who has missed the last four games with a right ankle sprain, has been upgraded to questionable. Lauri Markkanen’s death plague has been ameliorated — now listed as a common cold. It’s probably due to the fact that Utah doesn’t want to be seen lurking in the gutters on NBC, but they probably aren’t good enough regardless, without a genuine starting center. The Rockets side has a few trickles, namely Jae’Sean Tate, Steven Adams and Fred VanVleet named on theirs.
There’s no doubt due to this Nurkic injury that Kyle Filipowski will spring to the starting lineup once again. He was the first iteration of the tall ball at the beginning of the season, where the Jazz ran a Markkanen-Filipowski-Kessler frontcourt. Now he’s entrusted with the grave task of protecting the paint. I should clarify that Flip has, and probably never will be a defensive presence, but it should never really matter considering the ceiling of all his other NBA attributes. You’ll never notice until the end of the game when he’ll rack up 17 points and 11 boards in a close 8-point loss.
Truth be told, this is a basketball game the Jazz are not entirely interested in winning. They’re not the bottom feeders they’d like to be, coughing up some devastating victories against Memphis and Sacramento. Oh, how far they have risen. The best we can do at this point onwards is wear a shirt with big bold letters that read “A LOSS FOR US IS A LOSS FOR PRESTI” — that’ll get the point across. Especially tonight, considering they’re facing a team that is nearly as incompetent as the Utah Jazz are at taking care of the ball. Utah’s still one of the heavy hitters, recording the second-most turnovers per game at 16.0. Houston doesn’t sit far behind at seventh, giving up 15.4 per game. They both struggle to force turnovers on the defensive end, ranking 24th and 21st in opponent turnover rate.
Truthfully, the Rockets are in a tall, athletic guard dilemma. They’ve been too reliant on Fred VanVleet pre-injury, leaving no one else who can run a half-court set. Amen Thompson has attempted to take on those responsibilities to little success, but he’ll still punish you on nearly every other aspect of basketball, with the exception of three-point shooting. When he was drafted, he was either the mythological 6’7” point guard or a bust who came from a league named after a Gen Z social media brand. He can attack closeouts. He can drive later in the clock if the Rockets have thrown everything else out there. He’s Andrei Kirilenko, trying to play the point guard role with occasional success. Thompson is at his most dangerous on the open floor. The Jazz will likely have to sprint down immediately if they want any success — no complaining to the refs, no slow jogs.
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It’s too late for Houston to pull out of the Kevin Durant saga now. They need to gear up for Playoff mode, but it won’t start tonight against the low-hanging Jazz. Both teams have probably mutually agreed on what needs to happen for both of their sakes. For us, it’s just another 48 minutes we can experiment on.
Injury Report
Jazz:
PROBABLE – Lauri Markkanen (illness)
QUESTIONABLE – Keyonte George (right ankle sprain)
OUT – Walker Kessler (left shoulder surgery)
Rockets:
OUT – Steven Adams (ankle surgery), Jae’Sean Tate (right knee sprain), Fred VanVleet (torn ACL)
How to watch:
Who: Utah Jazz (18-39) at Houston Rockets (34-21)
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When: February 23rd, 7:30PM Mountain Time
Where: Toyota Center, Houston
Channel: Peacock, Jazz+, KJZZ
Radio: 97.5/1280 The Zone
