Salt Lake Tribune - Jazz: Utah feels good after it escaped from Atlanta with a win
Posted: 3:45 PM- CHARLOTTE, N.C. - There is still time to ruin Christmas, but the Jazz already feel like they have received their holiday gift.
"We were fortunate to hang in there and get the win" Wednesday night in Atlanta, Derek Fisher said. "If we had lost this game, it would have made this trip very difficult. .
.. It would have made it a disappointment.
" It still can be, though the schedule now bestows two of the league's three worst teams on the Jazz, who wind up their Christmas trip with the 6-18 Bobcats Friday (5 p.m., FSN Utah) and the 6-30 Grizzlies on Saturday.
After the Jazz overcame a 21-point deficit in Philips Arena - the sixth-largest lead surrendered in the fourth quarter in NBA history - and shocked the Hawks 112-106, Utah players said their confidence in themselves and each other is back. "You have a difficult loss like we did in New York, then you get down early in your next game, you have to fight the tendency to look around and say, 'Where did our [ability] go?" said Fisher, whose 10-point fourth quarter helped fuel the Jazz rally.
"Things like that can affect you for a while if you let them. Fortunately, we were strong enough to fight our way back."
fourth quarter to win.
The last to do it was Milwaukee, who similarly rallied in Miami on Nov. 28, 2000. Fisher said the Jazz were not satisfied with their performance, and the notion was heartily seconded by their coach.
Utah committed a season-high 24 turnovers, including eight in a dismal third quarter, plus a couple of embarrassing ones when the Hawks were still within a basket. In one, a fast-break pass from Deron Williams was deflected by an Atlanta player and struck Fisher in the face; on the next possession, Williams assumed Fisher was taking the ball up the floor, and wasn't looking when Fisher's pass to him sailed out of bounds. "It got a little ugly, sure," Williams said, with a smile.
"Derek and I were talking about that, trying to figure out what happened." The Jazz also missed 16 free throws, though Mehmet Okur turned two of them into Utah baskets in the fourth quarter. And for the second straight game, they were outscored in the middle, where the Jazz's offensive strength usually lies.
"They put their body on us and we stood there," Sloan said. "We didn't get anything inside. They kicked our butts inside in the first half.
" Andrei Kirilenko is doing a little kicking of his own on the defensive end, though. The Jazz's do-everything forward deflected several passes from the sloppy Hawks, who committed 20 turnovers of their own. When the Jazz tried to defend the Hawks' scoring leader Joe Johnson with one of their guards, Atlanta began trying to take advantage.
Kirilenko kept it from becoming a problem. "We were mismatched a great deal, but we didn't want to go to a zone if we could keep from it," Sloan said. "Andrei picked a couple of those off when they tried to throw them in to [Johnson].
" Ronnie Brewer copied the tactic, too, and his anticipation of a pass to Johnson turned into the night's biggest play. The rookie intercepted the pass, and the Jazz scored seven points before Atlanta got the ball back. "Coach has been preaching to me to try to be more [active on] help defense and fake at them more," Brewer explained.
"When I faked [at moving toward Hawks guard Speedy Claxton], I knew he was going to dish to Joe." And everyone in Utah uniforms knew the Okur would be deadly from three-point range at the end. Okur hit four of his five three-point attempts, becoming the first Jazz player ever to connect on at least three three-pointers in five consecutive games.
"Memo just has that look right now. You know it, he knows it - it's going in," Fisher said. "Now we just need to hope this momentum carries over into the rest of the road trip.
" That hope made for a festive locker room afterward, and the Jazz's relief turned into giddiness once word spread that Sloan cancelled Thursday's scheduled practice as a reward. The session had been planned for Marist School, a Catholic high school north of the city. It was to be something of a homecoming for Matt Harpring, whose prep jersey with No.
10 is hanging in its gym. So it must have been a crushing disappointment not to take his teammates back to his old homecourt, right? "I'd rather have no practice," Harpring said, with a laugh.
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