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The Utah Jazz extended their win streak last night in dominating fashion against the Detroit Pistons. What’s most impressive about the Jazz’s winning streak is that they’re not just beating teams, but destroying them.
During the win streak the Jazz have an average margin of victory of 16 points including an 8-point win over the Minnesota Timberwolves and a 20-point win over the Indiana Pacers.
The All-Star break was a bump in the road, but if you look at the last 21 games for the Jazz, it’s really impressive.
According to NBA.com, the Jazz have the best net rating in the NBA at 12.5 with the 15th best offense and the #1 defense in the league. The defense is what is truly remarkable. Look at the difference between the Jazz and the next best team.
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It’s the Utah Jazz and then everyone else. Honestly, when considering whether Rudy Gobert should be defensive player of the year, every voter should be required to look at this chart.
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Did Craig Bolerjack reveal when Dante Exum would be playing?
Seeing these two together makes me so happy pic.twitter.com/GmvjgW1ohD
— James Hansen (@hansenjames) March 14, 2018
I recorded this during the Detroit Pistons game and Craig Bolerjack clearly says “Dante Exum...we can see him Thursday night.”
On Tuesday, the news came out that Exum was assigned to the Salt Lake City Stars and went through practice. With three weak opponents coming up for the Jazz (Suns, Kings, Hawks), this is the perfect opportunity to work Dante back into the lineup. He can work through some of the kinks against teams not worried about winning. It’s the perfect scenario for the promising young guard.
The idea that the Jazz are playing this well and now get to infuse more talent into the team is pretty exciting!
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The playoff picture got a little rosier for Utah last night as the Denver Nuggets lost to the Los Angeles Lakers. I really like the probability charts below from Jacob Goldstein, a contributor to Nylon Calculus.
Projected playoff probabilities and seeding breakdown based off 10,000 simulations of the remaining #NBA season: pic.twitter.com/UaSI0O8Rkm
— Jacob Goldstein (@JacobEGoldstein) March 14, 2018
According to this simulation the Jazz have a 90% chance to make the playoffs and are most likely to land the 5th seed!
According to FiveThirtyEight.com the Utah Jazz have a 93% chance of making the playoffs!
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At what point do Jazz fans stop worrying about making the playoffs and start worrying more about which seed they’ll be in?
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I loved this story about Elizabeth getting a chance to meet the Jazz bear. Can we all agree that the Jazz Bear is the best?
This is Elizabeth. She’s visiting us courtesy of @makeawishutah for tonight’s game ❤️ She always wanted to meet @utahjazzbear pic.twitter.com/dfxYS1Hj1z
— Utah Jazz (@utahjazz) March 14, 2018
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Donovan Mitchell has a new ride.
Shoutout to @LHMUsedCarSM for always being there to hook me up #MotorSport pic.twitter.com/I6yX3Lyihz
— Donovan Mitchell (@spidadmitchell) March 12, 2018
Whatever it takes to keep Spida happy, the Jazz need to do it. It’s great to see they’re already finding ways to sweeten things for the young superstar. My suggestion would be giving him this car that was won at auction by Greg Miller... (it’s about 4:54 into the video where you see Greg)