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Hey all, sorry that the game coverage was not there last night, I was attending to family stuff and thankfully did not get a chance to watch the Utah Jazz @ Phoenix Suns game live. Had I, I can imagine I would have been very upset last night. Reading the game thread and Moni's excellent site I had a chance to re-live some of that fan anger (fanger?) from all of you passionate people. I am going to say that I felt like the Suns would have really tried hard in this game, after all looking at their schedule this is probably the last win of the season for them, and last home win to boot. They had just lost five games in a row and didn't want to lose to the Jazz on their home court -- something that rarely happens (Utah is now 24-60 in Phoenix). Those facts seemed to have been factors, in which the Jazz would end up losing* to the Suns.
I'm going to point out that I strongly believe that Rodney Hood should have been at the line to end that game, shooting three free throws for the win, instead of walking off the court with a two point loss.
And I'm not going to go into it any more than that. Having watched the full game now, and how the game was "officiated" this is how I felt after it:
If we are going to point fingers beyond the refs, well, the Jazz had 18 turn overs, and that led to 38 fast break points for the Suns. Utah only hit 7 of 21 three point attempts, that .333 is below average for the Jazz. One thing that the Jazz did take care of was hitting free throws as the team went a combined 20/24. That 83.3% is way above average, but not even getting to 30 FTA is just how the refs wanted to play it. At least they should have gotten 27.
Beyond that Gordon Hayward and Rodney Hood had very strong games. Rudy Gobert was a wall on defense, but Derrick Favors missed a lot of shots he usually makes. This team missed some firepower off the bench, and you can only imagine how this game would have been different if either Trey Burke or Alec Burks played. Meh. Utah should have won this game. And they should have had a chance to win it.
Utah's next games are a home and home series against the Sacramento Kings today (Sunday) and then on Wednesday.