SAN ANTONIO — Three thoughts on the Utah Jazz's 124-120 overtime loss to the San Antonio Spurs from KSL.com's Jazz beat writer, Andy Larsen.

1. Jazz lock Spurs down defensively in overtime until the shots were missed

Fresh off a miraculous comeback, the Jazz were in business in overtime, leading by three with three minutes left. That's when three plays happened that the Jazz will regret, losing out on three loose balls that let the Spurs come back and ultimately win the game in overtime.

The first was a wacky one. With the ball headed out of bounds and the shot clock about to run out, Donovan Mitchell saved it all the way to the other side of the court. In doing so, the referees (Marc Davis, Ron Garretson, and Gediminas Petraitis) ruled that Mitchell had gained control of the ball and then lost it again, granting the Spurs a new 24-second shot clock.

This is the shotclock reset play. This is both A) the way the NBA wants the officials to call these kinds of plays and B) the most ridiculous definition of possession ever pic.twitter.com/o2SRMUt9jf — Andy Larsen (@andyblarsen) March 24, 2018

The NBA has been consistent on this kind of play, so I think this is called as the league wants it to be. That being said, I think it's the wrong decision that the league wants it to be called like this. It's really hard for me to understand why this is called as the Jazz's possession: while Mitchell clearly held the ball, he wasn't standing in bounds while doing so, and the Jazz didn't have any advantage in making a play on the ball. Patty Mills comes up and nails a contested 21-foot jump shot, then does it again on the next play. Two shots that the Jazz would have liked to see, except for that the Spurs make it both times.

So now the Jazz only have a 1-point lead. Next Spurs possession, LaMarcus Aldridge takes an 11-foot jumper, defended by Rudy Gobert. It hits the rim twice (Mitchell was skying for the rebound on the first bounce), falling directly in the hands of Rudy Gay, who was surrounded by three Jazz players.

The Gay offensive rebound: pic.twitter.com/0SJeacXKn0 — Andy Larsen (@andyblarsen) March 24, 2018

Should the Jazz have gotten this rebound? It's hard to say: the Jazz big in the game was guarding the ball, and the other three best rebounders in the contest were going for it. It seemed like a case of Gay knowing that it was going to hit the rim twice and timing his jumping accordingly.

Next play, it's Gay missing the shot, and Aldridge getting the rebound and putback. Gobert gets a little bit outworked for this rebound, though Ricky Rubio almost tips it out of Aldridge's hands anyway. Even if Gobert does get outworked, it's understandable: Gobert tweaked his knee earlier on in proceedings and clearly wasn't able to be playing at full force.

The Aldridge offensive rebound: pic.twitter.com/d5cgLe1fik — Andy Larsen (@andyblarsen) March 24, 2018

"We should have done a better job," Gobert said after the game. "They're really physical, they pushed us, and obviously we didn't get any calls, but we had to get those rebounds. They had way too many second-chance points tonight." It was good defense, just until the time came to close out the possessions.

Those were the plays that changed the tide of the game, that took the Spurs from a 23.9 percent chance of winning to a 91.1 percent chance of winning, according to Inpredictable.

2. Donovan Mitchell-led comeback

But the only reason the Jazz had the chances they did in overtime was due to the play of their rookie Mitchell.

For stretches of the game, Mitchell could not buy a basket. He had 10 points at halftime, but was 5-15 from the field. Even while warming up during halftime, I saw him struggle with the jumper: he'd shoot a few short, try to adjust, end up missing long, before finally getting a make in and finding the happy medium.

So to begin the second half, Mitchell attacked the rim. He had nine points in the third quarter on 3-7 shooting, playing the entire quarter. That meant he had to be rested for the beginning of the fourth quarter, but did it ever pay off.

Mitchell was star-level in the fourth, scoring 14 points overall on some of the most incredible, clutch shots you'll see. It started on the defensive end: Mitchell had a steal in transition, which led to a Derrick Favors traveling turnover. On the next play, Rubio turned it over, but Mitchell got yet another transition steal. And just 20 seconds later, Mitchell got yet another steal on Aldridge, this time cutting the lead to three on a fast-break running layup.

Exhibit 🕷: pic.twitter.com/FpPwWuGWYx — Utah Jazz (@utahjazz) March 24, 2018

Mitchell wasn't done. With two minutes left and the Jazz down three, Mitchell hit a pull-up three to tie it. Then, Mitchell tied the game on the next possession with a driving layup. It seemed like Mitchell was going to take over the game, but on the next play, he turned the ball over, down two with 38 seconds left. A Manu Ginobili layup put the Spurs up four with 17.5 seconds left.

He wanted to atone for his error. So he took the next shot right from the inbounds pass, a 27-foot three that pushed the deficit down to just one. And after Spurs made free-throws (and a questionable non-call on Gobert), the Jazz were again down three, this time without timeouts, with just 10 seconds left.

So Mitchell drove the length of the court and made a double-contested pull-up three, just as the Jazz needed him to.

"THIS KID'S UNREAL!"#TakeNote#KiaROYpic.twitter.com/zWZYlYcwNK — Utah Jazz (@utahjazz) March 24, 2018

In the end, Mitchell's performance didn't last through overtime: he shot just 1-5 in that period. But overall, he ended up with 35 points and made an impression by making the kind of plays that superstars make. I don't think Haralabos Voulgaris was alone when he wrote this:

Donovan Mitchell reminds me a lot of Dame. — Haralabos Voulgaris ⚡️ (@haralabob) March 24, 2018

Spurs coach Gregg Popovich thought so too.

"He's tough, Popovich said of Mitchell. "Those two threes he hit were just ridiculous. He's got courage and he's got the skill and he's willing to take those shots, so you've got to give him credit. He did a heck of a job."

That let Popovich talk more about Mitchell: "He just keeps competing and has no fear. And he makes great decisions, he's got a great pace about him. He's not frantic, he's not running around crazy or anything. He plays a complete game, he's really something else."

When you get praise like that from notoriously tight-lipped Popovich, well, it's a good sign Mitchell is the real deal. While he was upset he didn't win this game, the Jazz are in good hands.

3. LaMarcus Aldridge scores 45

Another Jazz opponent got a career high against the Jazz this week, but this time, it was a big man. Aldridge scored 45 points on 19-27 shooting and really carried the Spurs to this win in one of the most important games of the season for any NBA team.

The Jazz started out giving Aldridge some open shots, thanks to some miscommunications on switches. Plays like this basically giving layups to Aldridge, who had 17 first-quarter points.

Aldridge got open early with some miscommunication like this: pic.twitter.com/9VaYpKSICA — Andy Larsen (@andyblarsen) March 24, 2018

Now, here's where the basketball hot-hand people would say something like "And when you give a guy a few makes to start the game, he feels comfortable throughout and will even make the tough looks."

First of all, the research shows that the hot-hand effect is either minimal (1-2 percent, according to this paper) or non-existent. It's basically non-existent in games because players keep taking tough shots because they feel hot, but once you adjust for shot difficulty, the hot hand effect goes to that statistically significant 1-2 percent.

Second of all, the Jazz definitely did not make Aldridge comfortable throughout. They began the second half by having Derrick Favors guard him, a player who is just as quick as Aldridge, but just somewhat smaller. Then, Gobert started guarding him, and even his 9-foot-9 standing reach couldn't bother Aldridge too much. It was just a wildly talented performance.

"He's capable of doing that," Jazz head coach Quin Snyder said. "He's seven feet tall and his release point is like where the jerseys are hanging."

"We just tried to make him hit tough shots, like he did all night," Gobert explained. "Most of the time he was ending up on the floor because we contested all of them. Just an unbelievable performance tonight.

Gobert's right. Look at this shot, for example. That's just ridiculously tough, and Aldridge sank it in his team's most important game of the season.

Make that 3️⃣7️⃣ points for Aldridge #GoSpursGopic.twitter.com/sOnr5kq0PO — San Antonio Spurs (@spurs) March 24, 2018

"We made him work, and he made the shots," Gobert repeated.

And unfortunately, just enough of them went down for the game to go to overtime.

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