At halftime the Utah Jazz trail the Dallas Mavericks: 61-56

With Luka Doncic and Kristaps Porzingis on the floor, the Utah Jazz have held their own with a small ball lineup and Jared Butler leading the way with 13 points and 3 assists. Butler might be really, really good.

The Utah Jazz play again tonight! It’s crazy how quickly the offseason came and went, and we hit the beginning of October running. The Jazz didn’t play very great basketball on Monday against the Spurs, shooting just 23.3% from three, 31.7% from the field, and overall just looking confused on both ends of the ball. Part of that was the significantly different frontcourt, with Rudy Gobert, Rudy Gay, Bojan Bogdanovic, and Joe Ingles sitting out, pushing Elijah Hughes and Hassan Whiteside into the starting lineup, fuzzing up the rotations and familiarity between teammates.

Dallas is largely bringing back their squad with the exception of 2020 offseason addition Josh Richardson, who brought much less to the table offensively and defensively than hoped. They shipped him to Boston for Moses Brown, who was a bright prospect at center last season with OKC. The big change with the Mavericks was 13-year coach Rick Carlisle resigning after a spat with the front office and up-and-coming Luka Doncic, instead signing the notoriously eccentric Jason Kidd. In light of the Mavericks’ 2018 fallout around Sports Illustrated’s bombshell report workplace around the toxic workplace culture, rife with misogyny and sexual harassment and Kidd’s 2001 conviction of spousal abuse, alongside revelations in Mirin Fader’s 2021 profile of Gianni’s rise that Kidd’s coaching ‘methods’ caused Larry Sanders to quit basketball in 2011, altogether had many fans upset with the hire, including our sister site Mavs Moneyball. In this first preseason game with the Mavs, we’ll see how he directs the ship after Luka and co (but mostly Luka, really) almost upset the Clippers in round 1 of the 2021 playoffs.

Game Info

When: 6:30 PM MT - Oct 6, 2021

Where: American Airlines Center, Dallas, Texas

TV: NBA TV, Bally Sports Southwest-Dallas, AT&T SportsNet-Rocky Mountain (allegedly)

Radio: KEGL/KFZO, KZNS/KTUB

Projected Starting Lineups

UTAH: G: Jared Butler G: Miye Oni (or maybe Jordan Clarkson) F: Elijah Hughes F: Royce O’Neale C: Udoka Azubuike

Update: Many Jazz players are resting tonight.

DAL (predicted): G: Luka Doncic G: Tim Hardaway Jr. F: Reggie Bullock F: Kristaps Porzingis C: Maxi Kleber

What to watch for

Can you actually watch this game?

One of the biggest storylines for game 1 was the fact that accessing a video feed of the game was all but impossible for Jazz fans. While San Antonio fans reportedly had access via the Official Spurs mobile app, with the revelation that Dish Network dropped AT&T Sportsnet and therefore the Jazz, Utah fans and casuals alike really got the runaround.

We’ll see if the Jazz find a way to provide some options, or if AT&T Sportsnet can quickly ink a deal with competitor DirecTV or some other service. It does look like all of the complaining did do something, but I assume we’d all love to see all of the games before next Monday.

Luka Doncic

Luka Doncic has been a revelation since he entered the league, with two All-Star nods and two All-NBA first team awards in three seasons, significant MVP buzz, and the all-important cover athlete designation of the NBA 2K22 game. In the 2021 playoffs, he nearly outplayed the Clippers single-handedly, pushing them to a Game 7, more than doubling second leading scorer Tim Hardaway Jr.’s 17.0 PPG, with a ridiculous stat line of 35.7 points, 7.9 rebounds, 10.3 assists, and 1.3 steals per game.

While it is a pre-season game and Luka will thus likely not play very much, it’s always a treat to be able to watch such an electric player.

Rotations

As mentioned above, Quin opted to started Elijah Hughes and Hassan Whiteside, and went with a pretty varied rotation with many minutes going around. Elijah led the team with 25 minutes, and 15 players got to play, with 12 playing 10 or more minutes. Expect to see another significant part of the “deep bench” tonight, perhaps with a slightly tighter rotation. With Jared Butler arguably being the Jazz’s brightest spot on Monday (a team high 16 points with 2 assists and 2 steals), far outplaying 2021-21 backup Trent Forrest, look out for Butler’s impact on the game tonight. Additionally, with Justin James being cut from his two-way contract after just 8 days, look for Marques Bolden, MaCio Teague, Derrick Alston Jr., or Malik Fitts to try to prove that they’re they ones to deserve that contract.

Go Jazz!