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SALT LAKE CITY — Nikola Jokic was in no man’s land. Rudy Gobert was rolling to his right, and Mike Conley was dribbling in. Jokic was stuck in between them — but not guarding either. Conley slipped a quick bounce pass to Gobert and he rocked the rim with a two-handed dunk.
It was the most basic action in the game and Denver was powerless to stop it.
“We had a lot of running around with no reason. We didn’t know what we were doing,” Jokic said.
Over the last two games, the Jazz have made the Nuggets look frustrated, confused and, frankly, just not very good. As of Saturday morning, the Jazz were first in the playoffs in points per game, offensive rating, field goal percentage, second-chance points, and 3-pointers made. Oh, and they’re also second in points in the paint. So basically, the Nuggets aren’t stopping anything.
“I think it's being able to focus on every little detail for the whole 48,” Donovan Mitchell said.
Joe Ingles joked that you might not want a view inside the team room as Jazz head coach Quin Snyder prepares for playoff games. Naturally, that brings to mind a picture of a crazed scientist, calculating every tiny little thing and running numbers and experiments in search of solutions — and maybe that’s not that far from the truth.
“Obviously, in a playoff series when you are playing the same team X amount of times, you can really hone in on a few things and things you want to do,” Ingles said of Snyder's game plan. “I mean, it's detailed. I don't really know what else to say. It's extremely detailed.”
The meticulous planning has allowed the Jazz to cut up the Nuggets on both ends of the court. On Friday in Game 3, Denver cycled through defensive strategy after defensive strategy and none of them worked.
“No matter what defense they throw at us, they know and we know how to beat that defense, then try to make the right decision,” Gobert said.
And now, everyone else knows too.
It's expected for coaches to make defensive adjustments from game to game. After Jamal Murray willed the Nuggets to a win in Game 1, Snyder put Royce O’Neale on him to try and prevent that from happening again. In the last two games, Murray has shot 11 of 29 from the field. But that was an assignment switch — not a change in scheme. What Denver did in Game 3 almost seemed like a panic move. The Nuggets had failed to stop the Jazz at all through the first two games of the series, so they decided to throw everything at them to see if anything stuck.
NBA playoffs: Jazz vs. Nuggets, 1st round
Utah leads series 2-1
- Game 1: Nuggets 135, Jazz 125 OT
- Game 2: Jazz 124, Nuggets 105
- Game 3: Jazz 124, Nuggets 87
- Game 4: Sunday, Aug. 23, 7 p.m., MDT, TNT
- Game 5: Tuesday, Aug. 25, TBD
- *Game 6: Thursday, Aug. 27, TBD
- *Game 7: Saturday, Aug. 29, TBD
*If necessary
All games will be played in Lake Buena Vista, Florida.
The thing is, it’s hard to implement new defensive tactics in the middle of a series. It often leads to players, as Jokic said, running around with no reason, not knowing what they should be doing. That’s how Jokic — not to mention and every other Nugget —ended up scrambling, and why the Nuggets left Gobert wide open at the rim time and time again. Snyder and the Jazz have been one step ahead.
“They can be as detailed and put emphasis on whatever they want to do. But as players, we have to go out there and do it,” Ingles said. “So, I got to give credit to the coaching staff for what they've, kind of, the position they put us in, and then to the players for going out and executing it. But like I said, it's still a long way to go and we're not getting ahead of ourselves at all.”
The Jazz have done things really well — and now it’s Snyder’s job to put his team in position for those things to still work. Utah is expecting Denver’s strongest punch on Sunday in Game 4; and to fully prepare for it, there will have to be some guesswork done. Will Paul Millsap be replaced in the starting lineup? Can Denver find a way to hide Michael Porter Jr. on defense? Will Gary Harris, who was elevated to doubtful, play in Game 4? Will Denver, which elected to not hold an official practice on Saturday, add any additional wrinkles?
“In many cases, if you do something well and you want to repeat it — and to the extent that you may try to anticipate something that they'll do to slow you down in some area,” Snyder said.
So, even after two dominating wins, the Jazz will return to the drawing board, so to speak, to make sure that success keeps happening.
“This is the playoffs. A part of the playoffs is being able to get to the next game,” Snyder said. “We have to be ready to play the next game and maintain our focus and our intensity, and that will be the challenge. I think our team is capable of doing that. I think they want to do that.”
